A youth’s half-burnt body was retrieved from an under-construction house at Sector 10 of CDA here on Tuesday morning. The body was identified that of one Smruti Ranjan Behera (22) of the locality, who was reported missing since Monday afternoon.
According to police, Smruti Ranjan runs a travel agency in the neighbouring Sector 11. Quoting family members, police said he left for his agency on Monday morning and since then remained incommunicado as his cell phone was switched off when his mother tried to contact him in the afternoon.
“We searched for him at our relatives’ houses and tried to contact his friends throughout Monday night. But his half-charred body was found inside an under-construction house this morning,” said his brother Sarthak, alleging that Smruti was murdered.
Sarthak suspected the hands of some of Smruti’s own friends behind the murder due to rivalry. Police are investigating the matter after sending the body for postmortem after registering a murder case.