BENGALURU: A 47-year-old private school owner from Davanagere filed a police complaint, blaming his wife and her live-in partner for the mysterious death of his five-and-a-half-year-old daughter. The woman, who has filed for divorce, was staying with her live-in partner and the child at a villa in Bengaluru.
On March 25, the woman’s brother called the school owner, B Praveen, and informed him about the girl’s death. Praveen, who grew suspicious, sent a copy of the child’s postmortem report to his sister, who is a doctor in England, asking her opinion. The doctor suspected foul play in the girl’s death, prompting Praveen, who is from Harihar in Davanagere, to file the complaint at the Kadugodi police station on Thursday.
In the complaint, he has named his 44-year-old wife, an advocate, and her 40-year-old live-in partner Mohan G Mahalingappa, a land developer, for the death of his daughter, P Venella. She died on March 24. The woman was staying with Mohan and Venella at a villa in Seegehalli in Kadugodi. Their other daughter, who is 17 years old, stays with Praveen.
“The live-in partner, Mohan, was arrested and is being questioned, while the search is on for the victim’s mother,” said a police officer.
In his complaint, Praveen stated that his wife met her college friend and former boyfriend Mohan in November 2025 when she was in Bengaluru handling a land dispute. She became close to Mohan over time and forced Praveen to sign the divorce papers.
The woman told her brother that around 11 pm on March 24, she ordered biryani and fed it to the child. In the morning, she found the child dead. She also allegedly gave another version, where she said that she and Mohan had gone to a restaurant in Kolar to celebrate her birthday. Before that, they had given Vennela ice cream and left the child sleeping inside the car with the air conditioner on, even as they went into the restaurant. Later, they took the child home and put her to bed, but found her dead the next morning.
Praveen’s sister, who is a paediatric specialist practising in England, told him that the wife and her live-in partner might have done something to the child that may have caused the death.
Praveen stated in his complaint that his wife and her boyfriend might have considered the child an obstacle in their relationship and eliminated her. He alleged that the two have kicked the child in the stomach and suffocated her to death. To conceal their crime, they later admitted the child to a hospital, he added. A case of murder and disappearance of evidence has been registered against the accused, the police said.