HYDERABAD: Nallakunta police arrested two persons, including a woman, Saturday for the murder and theft from an old woman at Vidyanagar.
Cops recovered gold ornaments weighing six tola and a pencil sharpening blade, said to be the murder weapon, and other incriminating objects.
Police said that Jonnalagadda Nitya Gayatri, a resident of Padmarao Nagar and Mukkavilli Venkata Srinivas, resident of Nagaram village in Ranga Reddy district committed the murder for monetary gains.
On January 3, they broke into a house and finding an old woman, they first sprinkled chilly powder on her and then slit her throat. They then robbed her of gold. The duo were arrested Saturday and they reportedly confessed to the offence.
According to the police, Gayatri is a well educated woman who even completed her MBA in 2004. Her mother had died several years ago and she also lost her father, who was a colonel in the defence services, in an accident in 2004. She reportedly went into depression which increased later after her young daughter died due to health problems. Her husband, a young scientist names Sudhakar Sharma, who she married in 2008, also left her.
Gayatri was till then in a financially comfortable position and was the regional manager of a UK-based company.
But she was addicted to anti-depressants and took Alprazolam tablets.
Srinivas, also a well educated man, came in touch with Gayatri when his family approached her for marriage through a matrimonial website. Though Gayatri refused, the duo became friends and Srinivar used to frequent her house regularly and reportedly even started living together. He too was allegedly addicted to medication. The duo decided to commit offences to make ends meet and targeted old women who lived alone. Their modus operandi was to debilitate their victims by sprinkling chilli powder and then slitting their throat, before getting away with their valuables.