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Ggm murder: Family says killers sent them texts using Yuvraj’s phone for days
New Delhi Yuvraj Singh Manchanda, a 31-year-old real estate professional, was killed allegedly by a former colleague and her partner on September 6
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New Delhi Yuvraj Singh Manchanda, a 31-year-old real estate professional, was killed allegedly by a former colleague and her partner on September 6. But for two days after his death, his family, fiancee and friends kept receiving WhatsApp messages assuring them that he would return soon.
On the night of September 6, a message from his phone read: “Main theek hoon, meri chinta mat karna, jaldi aaunga (I am fine, don’t worry, I will be back soon)”. The next day, another message said: “Thursday, I will call. Take care of mom.” Hours later, another said: “I may have to go to Bangalore or Mumbai. My phone will be off. There’s some deal. Aap pareshan mat hona (Don’t worry about me)”.
A flight ticket from Noida to Bengaluru was also shared with the family on September 7.
Delhi Police investigators, who asked not to be identified, said the messages were sent by the accused using Manchanda’s phone after killing him.
The last message was sent on September 8 morning: “I can’t talk till Thursday (September 10). Going for a deal.”
His phone was switched off after that, after which his family started looking for him. On September 11, after he failed to call as promised, they approached Delhi Police.
“When there was no message or call after September 8, we started panicking… He had never done this. We visited the Sarita Vihar police station, then Lajpat Nagar police station. They filed a missing persons’ complaint,” said Manchanda’s sister Karishma.
Manchanda, the youngest of three siblings, lived with his parents in Sarita Vihar. He is survived by his parents and two elder sisters. The last time Karishma saw him was on September 6, when they went to Lajpat Nagar to buy a sherwani for his wedding, followed by a meal at Golden Dragon restaurant. “He was supposed to get married on October 25,” she said.
His childhood friend Parth Kapoor said: “On September 15, when we still had no idea where he was, we contacted his manager who told us that Yuvraj’s last live location was in Gurugram, till September 6. She told us that all sales representatives have to share the live location with the manager. She also told us that Yuvraj had informed that he was going to meet Anya Vats, his former colleague,” he said.
Manchanda’s body was recovered from a sewer in Gurugram’s Sector 70 on September 10. Four days later, Gurugram Police cremated the body as that of an unidentified man after an autopsy, while his family, around 15km away, was still searching for him.
The information about Vats led Delhi Police to track her down. DCP (southeast) Vineet Kumar said Vats’s phone had been switched off, but investigators later detected a new number being used by her and traced her presence to Uttarakhand. A team subsequently apprehended Vats and her partner, Sanyam Sachdeva, from a lodge in Kainchi Dham on September 16.
A senior Delhi Police officer said the accused allegedly kept Manchanda’s body in Vats’s Creta for two days after killing him before dumping it in the sewer on September 8. “They kept driving around with the body for two days in Gurugram. Then they left for Uttarakhand,” the officer said.
Police have seized the Creta and recovered a gun allegedly used in the killing, officers said. Vats and Sachdeva have been in a relationship for several years, live together in a rented house in Gurugram and have a five-month-old child, police said. Both worked as freelance real estate dealers.
CCTV footage from September 6 allegedly shows Manchanda meeting Vats and Sachdeva outside a Gurugram mall, where he parked his car and got into their vehicle, police said. After a heated argument, Vats allegedly shot him. “We suspect that the three fought over a deal or common clients. But nothing is clear,” a senior officer said.
Police said Vats has three criminal cases, including cases related to cheating, domestic violence and the IT Act.
Karishma said the family knew Vats as Manchanda’s former colleague. “They worked together at one realty firm till April 2022 but soon he left. She was fired over financial irregularities. She was also black-listed,” she alleged.
She said Manchanda had later told his fiancee about an upcoming meeting with Vats over a deal unrelated to his current workplace.
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