Decorated former cop gets life in jail for killing API

Former policeman Abhay Kurundkar, a President’s medal recipient, was on Monday sentenced to life imprisonment by a Maharashtra court for the 2016 killing of Assistant Police Inspector Ashwini Bidre-Gore, with whom he was in an extra-marital relationship.

Additional Sessions Court Judge (Panvel) KG Paldewar last month convicted Kurundkar under relevant provisions of the Indian Penal Code for murder and other offences.

Kurundkar’s associates Kundan Bhandari and Mahesh Phalanikar were held guilty of destruction of evidence and sentenced to seven years in jail.

Ashwini Bidre-Gore (37), an API with the Navi Mumbai police’s human rights cell, went missing on April 11, 2016.

The police had initially registered a case of abduction against Kurundkar, his driver Bhandari and his friends Dyandev Patil, who has been acquitted, and Palnikar. Following an extensive probe, the charge of murder was added to the FIR.

As per police, Kurundkar was in an extra-marital relationship with Gore.

He killed her on April 11, 2016, with the help of others in Mukund Plaza in Bhayander in neighbouring Thane district.

Her body was then dismembered, the parts were kept in a refrigerator and later disposed of in Bhayander creek.

Kurundkar had received the coveted President’s medal for meritorious service on Republic Day in 2017, another police official said.

Kurundkar, who was inspector with the Thane Rural police, was arrested on December 7, 2017.