Radhika Yadav murder case: Father in judicial custody, mother gets clean chit

Deepak, 51, was arrested from the family’s residence soon after the murder of his daughter, a tennis player who ran an academy, took place on Thursday morning.

A city court on Saturday sent to 14-day judicial custody Deepak Yadav, who is accused of shooting his daughter Radhika Yadav dead at their Sector 57 home.

A team from Sector-56 police station produced Radhika Yadav's father Deepak Yadav in the district court and sent him to 14-day judicial custody in Gurugram on Saturday. (HT PHOTO)

Meanwhile, investigators part of the case gave a clean chit to 25-year-old Radhika’s mother, Manju Yadav, saying that she neither knew about Deepak’s alleged plan to murder their daughter nor had she witnessed the shooting.

Deepak, 51, a builder, was arrested from the family’s residence soon after the murder of his daughter, a tennis player who ran an academy, took place on Thursday morning.

His licensed revolver that he had allegedly used to shoot Radhika dead was also seized from his possession. Four bullet wounds were found on Radhika’s back and the pellets were extracted during the autopsy.

Police had sought his two-day remand for interrogation. However, the court had granted only one-day remand on Friday.

Sandeep Kumar, public relations officer of Gurugram police, said on Saturday that any evidence proving involvement of Radhika’s mother in her killing has not surfaced as of now. “She had no inkling that Deepak was going to kill their daughter,” he said. “There was initial suspicion that she might have also been involved in the killing but nothing adverse was found against her. Investigation indicated that Deepak had acted alone in Radhika’s murder,” he said.

Meanwhile, investigators said that after meeting his relatives in police custody, Deepak had broken down for the first time on Friday, and urged them to ensure that he is executed for killing his daughter.

Police officers interrogating Deepak, meanwhile, said his replies to their questions were few. “He has offered limited information. Probably, he is in a state of shock or remorse...,” said an investigator, who did not wish to be named.

He also told police that he suspected that “people were talking about him living on his daughter’s earnings”, which made him feel “humiliated”, police said.

According to the police, Deepak claimed he was battling depression for the past 15 days due to this social criticism.

In his confession, he said he could no longer bear the humiliation which had hurt his “pride”, as mentioned in the FIR accessed by HT.

Deepak had also allegedly started pressuring Radhika to close her tennis academy, which had also led to tension and arguments at their house, and the subsequent killing, said police.

Deepak allegedly shot Radhika, a state-level tennis player, four times in the back while she was cooking breakfast in the kitchen of their three-storey home in Block-G of Sushant Lok-2 Thursday, police said.

“He admitted during questioning that he planned the murder,” said PRO Kumar. “He typically bought himself milk in the mornings, but on Thursday, he asked his son to go instead. Once alone with Radhika, he pumped four bullets into her while she was cooking breakfast,” he added.

Police said they will again interrogate the family members and other acquaintances. A gunpowder residue swab analysis and other forensic reports will also be collected based on police will file a charge sheet against Deepak, officers said.

Radhika was a state-level athlete who had reached a career-high ITF doubles ranking of 113 in November 2024, and was ranked fifth in Haryana in women’s doubles. She opened a popular tennis academy in March this year and was also popular on social media.

A graduate of Scottish High International School, she cleared her Class 12 exams in commerce in 2018 and had taken to tennis early in her school years. She had recently suffered a shoulder injury and was undergoing physiotherapy, but that hadn’t deterred her from running her academy.