A teenage girl and two men allegedly murdered her adoptive mother in Odisha over disapproval of relationships and property motives
OdishaPlus Bureau
In a tragic incident, a class 8 female student and her two male companions were apprehended on Friday in the Gajapati district of Odisha for the alleged murder of a woman who had taken the girl in after rescuing her from a roadside when she was merely three days old, according to a police official. The authorities reported that the girl and her associates suffocated the victim, identified as 54-year-old Rajalaxmi Kar, at her residence in Paralakhemundi on April 29.
The alleged motive behind this act was her disapproval of the girl’s association with the two young men and a desire to seize her property. Following the crime, the suspects concocted a narrative suggesting that Rajalaxmi had succumbed to a heart attack. The following day, they cremated her remains in Bhubaneswar, where some of her relatives lived. Given Rajalaxmi’s medical history of heart issues, her family, including her brother, accepted the fabricated account, as stated by Gajapati SP Jatindra Kumar Panda.
The truth was revealed when the girl’s uncle discovered her concealed mobile phone in Bhubaneswar, which contained Instagram Messenger conversations with the two co-defendants outlining their scheme to murder Rajalaxmi and steal over 70 grams of gold jewelry along with ₹60,000 in cash.
Following this revelation, Siba Prasad Mishra, the brother of the deceased, filed a First Information Report (FIR) at the Paralakhemundi police station last Wednesday. A police investigation subsequently led to the apprehension of the three suspects — temple priest Ganesh Rath, Dinesh Sahu, both from Paralakhemundi, and the deceased’s 13-year-old adopted daughter.
Authorities stated that Rajalaxmi had adopted the girl after rescuing her as an abandoned infant in Bhubaneswar. After the girl enrolled at Kendriya Vidyalaya in Paralakhemundi, the two moved there and resided in a rented accommodation. Recently, the girl formed a relationship with Rath and Sahu, which her mother disapproved of. Rath allegedly encouraged the girl to murder Rajalaxmi in order to acquire her property and maintain their relationship. On the evening of April 29, the girl reportedly administered sleeping pills to Rajalaxmi.
After she lost consciousness, she called upon her two companions, who suffocated the woman with pillows. Subsequently, they transported her to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead, according to police reports.
Before the homicide, the girl had given some of Rajalaxmi’s gold jewelry to Rath, who pawned it at a private finance firm for approximately ₹2.4 lakh. It is alleged that he utilized the funds to purchase a motorcycle and travel throughout the state. During the investigation, authorities recovered three mobile phones containing damning Instagram messages, two pillows used in the crime, and about 30 grams of the stolen gold jewelry, as stated by the police.
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