BELAGAVI: The recent suspicious death of real estate businessman Santosh Padmannavar has taken a dramatic turn, with his daughter filing an FIR against her mother.
Police have started an investigation, based on the complaint filed by Santosh’s daughter Sanjana. They have started grilling Santosh’s wife and are also on the lookout for her friend, who allegedly helped her in the crime.
Santosh Padmannavar (47), who was a social activist and realtor, and a resident of Mahantesh Nagar, Belagavi, died under suspicious circumstances on October 9. He is survived by his wife Uma Padmannavar, a daughter and two sons.
Earlier, Uma Padmannavar had told everyone, including the family, her daughter and sons that Santosh had died after a heart attack, and she had held his funeral on October 10 after donating his eyes to a private hospital, as was his last wish.
However, Sanjana, who is studying in Bengaluru, doubted the sudden demise of her father as he was a healthy person. Since Santosh had installed about 16 CCTV cameras in his house, she expressed her curiosity to check the CCTV footage after the funeral.
Uma asked her to have a bath before seeing the videos. When she returned to watch the videos, she learnt that the CCTV footage was deleted. When Sanjana inquired about it with her younger brothers, they admitted that they had deleted the CCTV footage as per their mother’s instructions.
Doubting her mother, Sanjana discussed the issue with her uncle and relatives and registered an FIR at Malamaruti police station against her mother. Acting on the complaint, police started an inquiry.
CCTV footage from a neighbouring house revealed two unknown persons entering Santosh’s house before his death on October 9.
Police then exhumed Santosh’s body in the presence of Assistant Commissioner Shravan Kumar and asked the forensic team to conduct a postmortem to know the exact cause of death. Police also started questioning Uma.
The police commissioner said, “We will know the exact cause of death after the autopsy report comes. We are also trying to recover the deleted CCTV footage.”