Two people were arrested on Sunday for the murder of former queen and the princess of the erstwhile Naiguwh principality in Madhya Pradesh’s Chhattarpur district. The accused allegedly killed the two women as they were humiliated, implicated in a false theft case and not paid share cropping dues by the dead, police said.
Charred bodies of the 80-year-old former queen— known as Yuvrani—and her 40-year-old daughter, Baby Raja, were found in the palace on February 19.
Nandi Rajput, 45, a share cropper on the land owned by the erstwhile royal family, and his friend Munna alias Harisingh Yadav, 40, were arrested for the double murder. Rajput, who also supplied milk at the palace, was the first to raise alarm about the palace being mysteriously closed for two days.
According to Chhattarpur superintendent of police (SP) Lalit Shakyawar, Baby Raja had allegedly refused to pay Rajput Rs 60,000 share cropping dues. She had allegedly also got Rajput’s brother implicated in a false jewellery theft case two years ago.
During questioning police had come to know that Rajput was upset with Baby Raja for not getting his share cropping dues. He recently had come to know that Baby Raja had sold a plot for Rs1 lakh. He hatched the murder plot on February 16 night after Raj Bahadur, the queen’s son, left the town to attend a marriage in Jhansi (UP).
Rajput and Yadav are reported to have scaled the palace walls from the rear. They first thrashed Yuvrani and later stifled her to death with their feet in her room before moving into Baby Raja’s room and killing her in a similar fashion, the Chhattarpur SP said. To mislead the police the accused dragged the bodies to Baby Raja’s room and put the latter’s hand on an electric heater, said Shakyawar.
{{/usCountry}}Rajput and Yadav are reported to have scaled the palace walls from the rear. They first thrashed Yuvrani and later stifled her to death with their feet in her room before moving into Baby Raja’s room and killing her in a similar fashion, the Chhattarpur SP said. To mislead the police the accused dragged the bodies to Baby Raja’s room and put the latter’s hand on an electric heater, said Shakyawar.
{{/usCountry}}The police have recovered Baby Raja’s cell phone, which was stolen by Rajput and Yadav. They have also recovered Rs 2,000 out of the stolen Rs 4,000.
According to police sources, Rajput and Yadav could be nabbed after police traced the cell phone location.
Rai Vijay Bahadur Singh, the king of the erstwhile princely state, had died a few years ago. The family still owns considerable agricultural land and property worth crores in the area.