‘He was very normal, calm, composed’: Woman who dated Aaftab after Walkar

Poonawala met the woman through Bumble in the last week of May — days after he allegedly killed Walkar, said police.

The Delhi Police on Wednesday said they have recorded the statement of a psychologist whom Aaftab Poonawala reportedly dated after he allegedly murdered his girlfriend Shraddha Walkar, with the woman telling investigators that she visited his rented flat in Chhattarpur Pahadi twice in October and that she didn’t suspect anything amiss.

New Delhi, India- November 14, 2022: File photo of Aftab Poonawala. Delhi Police cracked a six-month-old blind murder case, and arrested a man for allegedly killing his 28-year-old live-in partner, and for chopping her body into 35 pieces and disposing of them at different places in and around the national capital. The accused has been identified as Aftab Amin Poonawalla (28), a resident of Mumbai, who was caught on Saturday on the basis of the deceased's father's complaint and has been sent to police remand for five days, the police said on Monday, in New Delhi on Monday, November 14, 2022. (HT Photo)

According to a Delhi Police officer aware of matter, Poonawala met the woman through Bumble, a dating app, in the last week of May — just days after he allegedly killed Walkar. Police have approached Bumble for details of the suspect’s activities over the past few months. Investigators involved in the case said that they believe he was in touch with several women after the alleged murder. The psychologist was one of them, said police.

The officer said the woman told them that she “could not imagine” that body parts of a woman could be in the house and that he seemed “very normal, calm and composed”.

Poonawala allegedly killed Walkar on May 18, chopped up her body over the next two days, and then spent the next three months disposing of the pieces across south Delhi and Gurugram. Going by this version of events, it is likely that he disposed of all of Walkar’s body parts by August, before the psychologist went to his flat.

According to investigators, Poonawala gifted the psychologist perfume bottles, apart from a ring that police have recovered and said it possibly belonged to Walkar.

The woman’s statement has been recorded under Section 161 of the Criminal Procedure Code. She reportedly visited the house for the first time on October 12.

To be sure, any witness statements hold evidentiary value if it can lead to the recovery of incriminating evidence.