Decapitated woman was killed by brother-in-law, claim police

Man chopped up his wife’s sister-in-law into eight pieces, tossed pieces into Pinyari Canal

HYDERABAD:

The young woman whose decapitated head was found in a canal in Hyderabad on May 15 was allegedly killed by her sister-in-law's husband. Hyderabad SSP Peer Muhammad Shah informed a press conference at the police headquarters on Friday that the suspect, Munsif Lodhi, has been arrested along with his wife, who is being charged for connivance.

The police have also obtained their three-day physical remand for interrogation from the judicial magistrate.

"Munsif throttled her [27-year-old Hina Janjua Lodhi] to death and later cut her body into eight pieces and packed them in three separate bags," the SSP said, adding that the suspected killer later threw the bags at three separate locations along the Pinyari Canal.

Initially, the police found her head and after his arrest, Munsif led the police to the spot where he had thrown her legs, which were also found. The police are searching for the third bag. The knife with which the suspect slaughtered the woman has also been recovered.

The crime was committed in the Lodhi family's home in Ghumanabad area, located near the Pinyari canal in Hyderabad. Munsif, according to the police, lived in his in-laws’ house before recurrent quarrels between him and Hina's husband Adnan Lodhi and his brother compelled him to shift to a rented home in the same locality.

On May 12, Munsif visited his in-laws’ house where his wife Rukhsana and Hina were alone. He then went straight to Hina's room where he committed the offence which he claimed before the police was not pre-meditated.

Adnan, a motorcycle mechanic, told the police that his slain wife, whom he married over a year before her murder, often complained about Munsif's harassment.

"I also stole Hina's two jewellery sets and Rs20,000 cash from her cupboard and concealed the sets and cash in my home behind an electricity board," Munsif told the media. Rukhsana, who cleaned the washroom where Hina was cut into pieces, claimed that she did not kill Hina but only helped her husband remove the traces of the crime after receiving threats from him.

The SSP said that sections of the Anti-Terrorism Act will also be added in the FIR against the couple.