In a shocking incident, a BJP worker and four members of his family, including two minors and a senior citizen, were found murdered at their Aradhana Nagar residence in Nagpur on Monday morning.
Identifying five members of the slain family as Kamlakar Pawankar (52), his wife Archana (45), mother Meerabai (73), daughter Vedanti (12) and nephew Krishna (5), the Nagpur police said that the five were attacked and killed by the assailant using a sharp weapon. The gruesome murder is believed to have taken place when the five members of Kamlakar’s family were asleep.
Apart from being a small-time businessman dealing in property and mobile phone repairing business, Kamlakar was a local BJP leader.
Kamlakar’s brother-in-law Vivek Palatkar is a prime suspect in the case. A motorcycle belonging to Palatkar was found near the slain Kamlakar’s residence. Nagpur’s Joint Commissioner of Police, Shivaji Bodkhe said that Palatkar was released on bail two days ago in the murder case of his wife.
The multiple murders, which sent the orange city into a tizzy, came to light after one of Kamlakar’s neighbours received no response made to several telephonic calls Pawankar’s residence After being alerted, the police barged into Kamlakar’s residence and found him and four of his family members in a pool of blood.
Meanwhile, the Nagpur police constituted five teams to investigate the incident. “The bodies have been sent for post-mortem. While one team is trying to track down the culprit(s) behind the incident, four other teams are looking into four other angles of investigation,” a senior police official said.