NEW DELHI: People “angry” over the gruesome killing of Shraddha Walkar carried out candle marches in the city on Thursday to demand capital punishment for the accused, Aaftab Amin Poonawala, the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) said.
The candle marches were taken out from eight different locations in South Delhi’s Mehrauli area. They also demanded enactment of stringent laws against “illegal religious conversion and love jihad” in the national capital, the VHP national spokesperson Vinod Bansal told PTI on Thursday.
“The people angry over the gruesome murder of Shraddha Walker took out the marches in Mehrauli to pay tribute to the victim, demand speedy trial of her murder case and award of capital punishment to the accused within three months,” the VHP leader said.
“They will also demand enactment of stringent laws against illegal religious conversion and love jihad,” he added. The people’s candle march has been backed by the VHP and various other groups, Bansal said.
Poonawala allegedly strangled Walkar and sawed her body into 35 pieces which he kept in a 300-litre fridge for almost three weeks at his residence in South Delhi’s Mehrauli before dumping them across the city over several days past midnight. Police said the couple used to have frequent arguments over financial issues and it is suspected that there was also a fight between them that led to the killing.