The Mumbai police team in a joint operation with the Uttar Pradesh special task force has nabbed Shivkumar alias Sadhu from Babatpura area of Badagaon, Uttar Pradesh on Monday in the double murder cas
The Mumbai police team in a joint operation with the Uttar Pradesh special task force has nabbed Shivkumar alias Sadhu from Babatpura area of Badagaon, Uttar Pradesh on Monday in the double murder case of artist Hema Upadhyay and Haresh Bhambani. He will be handed over to the Mumbai police on Tuesday.
Sadhu has confessed to the crime to the UP police and said he did it on orders from his boss Vidyadhar Rajbhar. A manhunt is on for Rajbhar. The police has also detained three persons, including a driver, from Rajbhar’s warehouse. The bodies of Hema and Bhambani were recovered from a drainage in Kandivali area on Saturday.
According to the police, Rajbhar had been making replicas of paintings and exporting them for Hema and Chintan Upadhyay for several years.
Officials suspect the killer was loyal to Chintan and this could be the reason for the murder. Investigations have revealed that the killer called Hema promising her some information against her estranged husband Chintan. Hema and Chintan were undergoing divorce proceedings. Sources have also said that the suspect was angry with Hema over payment issues and that was another reason for calling her.
Sources have also informed The Asian Age that Rajbhar owned a warehouse in the Kandivali area and police officials suspect that Hema and Bhambani were killed in that warehouse.
On Monday evening about 4 pm, Hema was cremated in the presence of several artists and family members in Santa Cruz. Her husband Chintan was escorted by the crime branch to the cremation ground.
The crime branch was questioning him till Monday evening.According to sources, the police was tipped off about these suspects, when a Kandivali-based tempo driver approached them and said that the bodies which were dumped in the drainage was transported in his tempo.
The tempo driver also informed the police that he stayed near the warehouse owned by Rajbhar who often asked him to dump bags and boxes into the drainage.
However, when the tempo driver learnt about the recovery of bodies he realized that these were the same boxes which were given to him by Vidyadhar Rajbhar and so he approached the police. Later, the police rushed to the warehouse and detained the three labourers of Rajbhar who were present there. Officials are suspecting that at least five people were involved in this murder. Shivakumar, who was nabbed from Uttar Pradesh, worked for Rajbhar.
According to police sources, the preliminary inquiry has revealed that Chintan after coming to Mumbai had approached Rajbhar’s father, who own the above said warehouse. He used to give him sketches to make sculptures and also pack and deliver them according to orders. Later, Rajbhar had joined his father, and when Chintan moved to Delhi, Rajbhar started working for Hema, said the police.
In 2008, when Rajbhar’s mother was taken ill and had died, Chintan had helped him financially and given him almost '6 lakh. So, police officials suspect Rajbhar must be loyal to Chintan, who is being questioned. However, police officials have claimed that they could not find anything to link the murder with Chintan and the motive for it was yet to be established.
Even though the main suspect has not been nabbed yet, officials are working on two to three theories. According to sources, one police theory is that Rajbhar was angry with Hema over payment issues.
Another theory is that Hema was murdered because she had not given him any new orders and so Rajbhar was facing a financial crisis. He would often call up Hema for help but she would rudely turn him down irking him.
Sources have also said the police believes the lawyer was murdered only because he was accompanying Hema.
Bhambani’s daughter in her statement to the police has said that before leaving home, her father had told her that he was going to meet a client and the CCTV footage of Hema’s Andheri-based studio also confirmed his presence. According to sources, when the main suspect Rajbhar called Hema to his warehouse Bhambani had also accompanied her.
According to sources, Rajbhar was the last person to call Hema on the phone. On the pretext of settlement of money, Rajbhar had called her to his warehouse, and told her to sign on some documents. Hema also took her lawyer along thinking that he would be able to check the authenticity of the documents.
Hema’s father-in-law Vidhyasagar Upadhyay, who is a retired professor, said, “I can’t believe that Chintan is in anyway related with this murder.”
