KENDRAPARA: A 25-year-old man was arrested on Friday for killing his stepmother to get `2 lakh life insurance money of his father in Chhakana village within Kendrapara Sadar police limits.
Apart from the accused Santosh Biswal, police also arrested his wife 24-year-old Debasmita Biswal and an aide Dukhishyam Nayak for the murder of 39-year-old Sasmita Biswal, wife of Alekha Biswal.
After Alekha’s first wife died in 2001, he remarried Sasmita. Last year, Alekha died. On August 10, Sasmita went missing from her house following which her daughter Amita Biswal (17) filed a complaint with police suspecting foul play. Police recovered Sasmita’s body from Luna river near Bilabalarampur village in Marsaghai on August 21.
Police intensified its investigation and arrested Sasmita’s stepson Santosh, his wife Debasmita and their aide Dukhishyam, said Kendrapara Sadar IIC Maheswar Sethi.
During interrogation, Santosh and his wife confessed to have hatched a plan to murder Sasmita with two accomplices, Dukhishyam and Pradip Rout, to get the insurance money of Alekha. When the victim refused to part with her husband’s insurance money, Santosh and his two accomplices strangulated her to death on August 10 night. The next day, they took her body on a motorcycle and dumped it in Luna river from the bridge at Basapur.
The IIC said Santosh planned the murder to lay his hand on the insurance money, which was to be paid to Sasmita as she was the nominee, and the property of Alekha. The accused was under the impression that after the death of his stepmother, he will inherit all the property as the sole legal heir of his father.
A case has been registered against the accused under Sections 302 (murder), 201 (destroying evidence) and 120 B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC. Efforts are on to nab Pradip, who is on the run, Sethi said.
All the three arrested were produced in court and remanded in judicial custody after their bail pleas were rejected, the IIC added.