Karnataka CID files charge sheet over Jain monk’s murder

Jain seer Acharya Kamakumar Nandi Maharaj of Nandiparvat Jain Ashram was found dead on July 5 this year and his body parts were recovered from a bore well, according to police

The Karnataka Crime Investigation Department has submitted a charge sheet exceeding 500 pages in connection with the murder of a Jain monk in Belagavi district of Karnataka, officials familiar with the matter said on Friday.

Karnataka CID submits charge sheet of over 500 pages in connection with the murder of a Jain monk in Belagavi district of Karnataka. (Representational Image)

Jain seer Acharya Kamakumar Nandi Maharaj of Nandiparvat Jain Ashram was found dead on July 5 this year and his body parts were recovered from a bore well, according to police.The accused identified as Narayan Mali and Hussain Dalayat had allegedly “given the seer electric shock, dismembered the body, and disposed of the parts in a borewell,” an officer familiar with the contents of the charge sheet said.

According to the officials from the CID, the charge sheet, submitted before Belagavi principal district and sessions court, includes statements from “10 eyewitnesses and 164 material pieces of evidence”.

According to the officials, on the night of July 5, prime accused Narayan Mali — a close associate of the monk — along with Dalayat, had taken the seer to his farmhouse in Hirekodi village. “They (the accused) killed him by giving him an electric shock, chopped his body into three pieces, wrapped them in a cut saree, and dumped them in a dry bore well on his farm”, an officer quoted from the charge sheet. Soon after the incident, the ashram staff lodged a missing report of the monk, based on which the police started a probe into the incident. On July 7, the police arrested the two accused. “After misleading attempts, the two accused were arrested,” said the police. During the initial inquiry, the accused had claimed that they disposed of the body into the Krishna river, but later confessed that they had dumped the body in the borewell, said police.

“After digging about a hundred feet from earth-moving machines, the police found the chopped pieces”, according to an official. Later, an autopsy confirmed the identity of the monk, said the official.

During interrogation, Mali claimed that the monk was “involved in money lending to run the ashram’s residential school”.

Talking about the motive, police said that accused Mali “had a strained relationship with the monk over a ₹6 lakh loan leading to the murder”. During the probe, the CID had found a personal diary maintained by the monk detailing all his business transactions. The CID, which had taken over the case on July 25, questioned all the names listed in the diary.

Reacting to the development, Chikkodi deputy superintendent of police Basavaraj Yaligar, who investigated the case before the CID took over, said :“We haven’t left a single material evidence to prove the charges against the accused which is evident in the charge sheet.”