Police on Thursday arrested the prime accused in the death of woman sarpanch candidate Mini Dalabehera, following which it has come to the fore that she was killed over a love affair, informed Gajapati SP Sushil Panigrahi at a Press conference held at the Mohana police station.
The arrested, identified as Sudhir Gamang (30) hailing from Ramachandrapur village under the R Udayagiri police limits in the district, had developed a relationship with Mini.
Sudhir has confessed before the police that he killed Mini after she started developing relationship with another person, the SP said.
Sudhir said he had hit Mini’s head with an iron rod, and after she died, he poured kerosene and set the body on fire. Before this, he had taken out all gold and silver ornaments from her body. later, he buried the ornaments and her mobile SIM in the yard of a rented house at Mahendragrh. Then, he went to Paralakhemundi.
The postmortem report of the deceased had revealed that there were multiple injuries on her body indicating that she was murdered while the burn injuries on the body suggested that she was set on fire after the murder.
However, no evidence of rape was found during the autopsy.
Notably, Mini’s half-burnt body had been recovered from a forest near the Sagada hill on January 16.
Mini, the former sarpanch of Baghamari panchayat under Mohana block, had filed her nomination paper on January 12 for the post of sarpanch for the upcoming panchayat elections.
She was then found missing, following which her family members had filed a missing complaint at the Chandragiri police outpost. Acting on the complaint, police recovered Mini’s half-burnt body from the forest.