9 killings in 24 hours echo in Upper House; facing flak, Delhi Police says crime under control
The issue of law and order in the national Capital in the wake of nine murders in the last 24 hours has created an atmosphere of unease among Delhiites, particularly senior citizens. The latest being the sensational murder of a septuagenarian couple and their domestic help in their South Delhi house.
The issue reverberated in the Upper House of Parliament after Sanjay Singh of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) raised it. Singh said Delhi is emerging as the “crime capital” of the country and urged the Home Ministry to convene a meeting to discuss the issue.
Meanwhile, a day after his party held the BJP responsible for a spurt in crimes in the national Capital, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said, “I will fully cooperate with the Centre to improve the law and order situation in the city.”
“The city has reported nine murders since Saturday. We need to work together to improve the law and order situation in Delhi,” Kejriwal said.
It may be noted that the AAP Government has started installing CCTV cameras at a large scale. “This will help a lot in controlling crimes in the Capital. We will get the feed of any crime taking place in the city. It will help in taking necessary steps immediately,” the Delhi CM said.
“All agencies, Governments and residents of Delhi need to work together. We will fully cooperate with the Central Government. Keeping politics aside, we need to work together to improve the law and order situation in the city,” Kejriwal said.
The CM’s remarks came a few days after he assured Prime Minister Narendra Modi of his Government’s cooperation to develop Delhi. At a meeting with the PM recently, he had said he would examine the possibility of integrating the Centre’s Ayushman Bharat programme with his Government’s health scheme in Delhi.
Since the AAP came to power in 2015, the Delhi Government has been at loggerheads with the Centre over several issues. Kejriwal, his Ministers and party leaders have often accused the Modi Government of creating hurdles for the city Government.
Facing flak for the deteriorating law and order situation and an increase in crime rate, Delhi Police top brass came claimed the crime situation is well under control in the city. However, the murder of elderly couple Vishnu Mathur and his wife Shashi Mathur, along with their domestic help Khushbu Nautiyal in their South Delhi house, has sent shock waves.
All the nine murders were committed within of the confines of homes and the perpetrators were either family members or known to the victims. “The job of police is to investigate and then prevent crime and the force is committed to do so,” said a top police official of the Delhi Police on the condition of anonymity.
The official said private tutor Upendra Shukla had killed his wife and three children at their Mehrauli home on Saturday morning. Some wrappers of medicines were also recovered from the house and two handwritten notes in Hindi and English in which Shukla confessed to killing his wife and children. He, however, did not give any reason for it, said the police official, adding that Shukla is suspected to be suffering from depression.
Later on Saturday evening, a 47-year-old woman, along with her husband, was brutally stabbed to death in Dwarka’s Mohan Garden extension. Police said prima facie it appeared that there was a friendly entry at the house and there was no sign of ransack in the house. They are survived by two sons.
When asked about the sensational triple murder in DDA flats of Basant Gaon that was spotted on Sunday morning, a police official privy to the investigation said, “The areas comes under the Delhi Police ‘Neighbourhood Watch Scheme’ and around 30-40 CCTV cameras are installed on the complex where the murder took place but there was no CCTV camera installed on the stairs leading to the house of the victims.”
In the Basant Gaon’s septuagenarian couple’ murder, police are questioning their domestic help Khushbu Nautiyal’s boyfriend, her relative and another person. So far police suspect that Khusbhu was in cahoots with the accused and it was she who opened the doors for the accused person(s) to gain entry into the Mathur’s household.
“It seems that she had called the accused as per their plan. Due to fear of getting arrested by police for the heinous crime, the accused even murdered Nautiyal, with the same weapon,” the official said.
Police is scanning CCTV cameras in the area to identify the accused. Police had earlier even detained a neighbour, who was seen in the CCTV footage at around 6 am but during questioning it was revealed that he was going to gym that time and he had no clue regarding the incident.
However, Khushbu’s boyfriend, who also hails from Pauri Garwahl, was caught in a CCTV camera installed opposite Mathurs house. He was seen entering their flat on Saturday night at round 11.30 pm. He was accompanied by another girl who had covered her face. Khushbu’s boyfriend and the unidentified girl were later seen exiting at 2 am. While her friend had covered his face with a helmet, the girl was seen covering her face with a scarf.
Police have found two cups with residue of tea and there was another glass with liquor in Khushbu’s room. It seems that they murdered Mathurs at around 12 pm and then killed Khushbu to obliterate all the evidences from the spot.
However, the police have not been able to unravel the ‘motive’ behind the triple murders as all articles and belongings were found to be intact. Two mobile phones belonging to the Mathur couple and two of their domestic help were found missing. All the four phones were switched off soon after the murder. The boyfriend of Khusbu had met her on a social networking site in December last and since then they had started talking to each other over phone. There were 800 calls between them, police said.
They have been detained by police for questioning but no arrest has been made so far, police officials said adding that the scope of the probe has been widened to unmask the killers. “We have lifted certain chance prints from the spot and motive behind the triple murders will be clear ones the accused are interrogated in police custody,” the official added.