In a shocking incident, a 35-year-old widow was arrested on Tuesday after she along with her live-in paramour allegedly beat her three-year-old son mercilessly to death at their Balegaon village residence in Ambernath tehsil of neighbouring Thane district.
The Hill line Police said on Wednesday that the motive behind the gruesome murder of the boy was that he had become a major bone of contention between Bharthi Baburao Shinde and her paramour Vishal Kumar, who had been living in together for the past one month.
Having arrested Bharati Shinde, the police have launched a manhunt for her paramour who has been absconding ever since the incident that took place at 4 pm on Monday.
Bharati, who hails from Nanded, lost her husband two years ago and had two sons from him. After she allegedly entered into illicit relationship with Kumar more than a year ago, she left her home along with her younger son and shifted her base to a village near Ambernath, where she began to live with her paramour.
Bharati, her son Aniket Amarjit Yadav and paramour were living together in Swapnanagari Chawl at Balegaon village near Ambernath for the past one month, when the incident took place.
The preliminary investigations have revealed that Bharati and her paramour used to quarrel frequently over Aniket. Given that Aniket was Bharati’s son from her earlier marriage, Kumar did not like the boy one bit. He would pester Bharati to get rid of Aniket somehow so that they could live happily.
Initially, Bharati would not approve of Kumar’s suggestion. However, she came around later to collude with Kumar in his conspiracy to eliminate Aniket.
“At 4 pm on Monday, Bharati and her paramour executed the murder plan. While the paramour held the upper and lower limbs of the child, the mother brutally kicked her son on his stomach. The child was declared brought dead when he was taken to a nearby hospital, a senior officer attached to the Hill line Police station said.
“As of now, we do not know much about Vishal Kumar. Based on the information we have gathered about the absconding accused from the arrested widow, we have launched a manhunt him,” the office said.
The police have, meanwhile, registered an offence under sections 302 (murder) and 34 (common intention) of IPC against both Bharati and Kumar.