Man kills labourer, fakes own death for insurance money

Tribune News Service 

Solan, December 5 

A man faked his death allegedly for making an insurance claim, but ran out of luck as the police nabbed him on suspicion that he had killed a labourer and burnt his body in his car.

Aakash, a resident of Dera Bassi, was arrested on Tuesday from the Palwal railway station in a joint operation of the Sirmaur police and the Government Railway Police, Haryana, Sirmaur SP Rohit Malpani said today.

“Prima facie, Aakash and his family wanted to grab huge insurance money, the value of which will be estimated after further interrogation of the accused,” the SP said.

He said Aakash’s relative Ravi Kumar, resident of Baltana, was also involved in planning and executing the alleged crime and was arrested on Monday from Nahan.

The police said a case of accidental death was registered at the Nahan police station on November 20, stating that a car had collided with a parapet at Judda Ka Johar and was completely burnt before the police could arrive. 

It was also stated that a person, Aakash, had died in the alleged accident and got burnt with the vehicle, they said. A team of Forensic Science Laboratory visited the spot the next day and took samples.

The SP said the police suspected some foul play when Aakash’s family started pressuring the police to release ‘death certificate’ the very next day of the “accident”, he said. “...and grew suspicious when a team of the Punjab Police came to Nahan a few days ago in search of a missing labourer from Rajasthan who was working with Aakash and was last in touch with him,” the SP said.

Meanwhile, Ravi visited Nahan on December 3.

The SP said as suspicion grew, the police nabbed Ravi from Nahan and produced him in the court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, which sent him to five-day police remand.

During interrogation, the police found out that Ravi was with Aakash when he burnt his car and then they left for Haryana. Aakash was further planning to flee to Nepal, the SP said. As per their plan, Aakash had deliberately collided his car with the parapet on the night of November 20 and set it afire, Malpani said. A police team chased Aakash till Varanasi but he managed to escape. 

Finally, he was detained  while he was travelling by a train from Bihar to Delhi. The accused would be produced in a court to seek his police remand for interrogating him and finding out the modus operandi used to kill the labourer, the police said. Ravi and Aakash were property dealers at Zirakpur. A fresh case has been registered under Section 302 (punishment for murder), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence), 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention).

(With PTI inputs)