BENGALURU: The case of a woman’s severed head in a bag, found in a truck carrying granite to Bagalkot, was solved on Monday. The woman, Latha, was allegedly murdered by Balachandra, who was having an affair with her widowed daughter-in-law.
The man killed Latha, aged 65, and attempted to pass off the murder as a train accident by placing her body on the railway tracks. While the head was found in Bagalkot, the body was found between Nidevanda and Hirehalli in Tumukuru district. Investigations led to the arrest of Balachandra on Monday morning.
Superintendent of Railway Police, South Western Railway, Sira Gowri told the media, “The incident occurred on July 19, when the body was found. Through sustained investigations, we unravelled details of the case and have taken the person who murdered her into custody on Monday.”
Giving details, she said that Latha, a senior citizen of Mandya, had gone to collect her old age pension. Her second son, Ramesh, had died and she used to have arguments with his widow to give her some money for maintenance.
“On July 19, she was on her way to collect her pension, and stopped at her daughter-in-law’s place in Tumakuru, and had a similar argument over maintenance. The woman was having an affair with Balachandra, a married man, who offered to take Latha to the office to collect the pension. He then invited her to his house. Latha again raised the issue of maintenance, and the duo had a heated argument and Balachandra hit her. She hit a wall and died,” the SP explained.
To conceal the murder, he quickly dumped her body on railway tracks near Ramamurthy Nagar. He visited the spot some time later and found a train had crushed the body into bits, with the head thrown far from the torso.
“He put the head into a bag and placed it in a truck carrying granite, on its way to Bagalkot. When unloading the material after reaching Bagalkot, the truck driver spotted the severed head and informed the police, who alerted Bengaluru police. We were already investigating the case and this helped us solve it,” the SP added. The elder son of the woman identified his mother.