KOCHI: Often, insufficient evidence and a lack of witnesses will leave investigators with no option but to rule what instinctively feels like homicides as suicides. The same is what unfolded in the Ashwathi murder case which rocked Thiruvananthapuram’s Nemom in 2013. Thankfully, good sense prevailed and the case was reopened nine years later after sustained appeals from the relatives, with the Crime Branch leading the investigation this time around.
The case
Before we delve further into how they cracked the case, let’s go back to 2013, to a cold December night, when shrill screams pierced the enveloping silence. Ashwathi was found torched at her residence in Nemom. Since circumstantial evidence didn’t hint at murder, the local police closed the case as a suicide. After all, it was known by then the woman was mentally troubled on account of her husband, Rathish, a drunkard who often beat her.
The two had fallen in love when Rathish, a labourer, had visited Ashwathi’s house for construction works. Ashwathi, who lost her parents at a young age, was living with her grandmother then. After marriage, the man became increasingly indecorous in his behaviour towards his wife and demanded that her family inheritance be moved to his name. Though Ashwathi’s grandmother objected to the very idea, she was helpless and eventually had to move out of the house.
The situation was further exacerbated by the discovery of Rathish’s affair with another woman. “I believe it is safe to say that Ashwathi did try to fix the relationship by taking Rathish and moving in with his family. However, her in-laws were not cooperative, especially the man’s sisters. Eventually, they had to move out. When news of Ashwathi’s death broke, there were rumours that it was the sisters who poured kerosene on her. Unfounded, of course. Interestingly, Rathish was the one who quashed them by hinting that Ashwathi might have killed herself. He sowed the seed,” says an officer who was part of the investigation.
Rathish and Ashwathi shared a rented house in Nemom with its owners. The house owner’s wife, Shanti, often looked after Ashwathi’s children when the latter was away at work. On that December night, she heard screams from the kitchen, and on reaching there, she saw the gruesome sight of Ashwathi’s burnt body.
The reinvestigation
A distinguishing trait of the Ashwathi murder case is that it has certain resemblances with the Chacko murder case, where the infamous Sukumara Kurup is the prime accused.
What helped officials in the latter case was the burn injuries that Bhaskara Pillai, Sukumara Kurup’s brother-in-law and accomplice in the crime, sustained on his arms while torching Chacko’s body. This was an important lead which aided the conviction of Pillai.
Similarly, Rathish, too, had burn injuries on his arms the same day as Ashwathi’s death. On enquiries then, he had dismissed them as ones sustained while trying to rescue Ashwathi. Due to insufficient evidence, local police, who investigated the case then, failed to follow up on this.
However, during the reinvestigation, the Crime Branch team cross-checked the statements received, especially that of the doctor who had conducted the autopsy. He highlighted that there were no burn injuries on the inner side of Ashwathi’s hands.
“When a person ignites themselves standing up, the body will be completely burned and discoloured. But in Ashwathi’s case, the inner side of her hand was only scaled. This fact informed us that her hand was likely pressed onto the ground during the death, thus disproving the theory that she ignited herself,” the officer says.
Also, Shanti’s statement that Rathish was sleeping in the other room while the former discovered Ashwathi’s body, too, convinced the officials that there was no way that he could have tried to save Ashwathi. “That’s not all. If a person standing upright catches fire, they are likely to knock a few things over on account of the pain. The kitchen was untroubled. Also, Ashwathi’s three-month-old was lying very close to the body. There’s no way Ashwathi would end her life in the presence of the infant,” the officer adds.
According to the team, Rathish was inebriated when he murdered Ashwathi and he probably kept the infant near Ashwathi in a moment of frenzy. A kerosene container and matchstick were found outside the house.
Case closed
Several new findings were good enough to trap Rathish, who had by then married another woman and settled down, never for once bothering to visit his two children with Ashwathi. On another round of interrogation, the man confessed to the crime, thus, ending a long chapter.
CasE diary
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