28 years after crime, man held for murder of 5

Rajkumar Amarnath Chauhan victims include a 27-year-old woman and her four children – between three months and five years of age, said the police. Chauhan’s two accomplices – Anil Saroj and Sunil Saroj – are still at large, police said. The two are said to be residents of Varanasi

Mumbai: Twenty-eight years ago, a mother and her four young children were brutally knifed to death by her three neighbours in Mira Road. The culprits escaped and the manhunt subsequently went cold. The case, however, did not end there.

28 years after crime, man held for murder of 5

On Friday, one of the murderers, identified by the police as Rajkumar Amarnath Chauhan, was caught as he landed in Mumbai from Qatar, where he had been working since 2007.

Chauhan’s victims include a 27-year-old woman and her four children – between three months and five years of age - said the police.

Chauhan’s two accomplices – Anil Saroj and Sunil Saroj – are still at large, police said. The two are said to be residents of Varanasi.

The Kashimira unit of the Mira Bhyandar – Vasai Virar (MBVV) police crime branch, who made the arrest, said that Chauhan is from Uttar Pradesh and was being taken to Kashimira.

The crime branch officers of MBVV police said that the three accused used to live in Mira Road and were neighbours to their victims; family of Rajnarayan Prajapati, his wife Jagrani Prajapati and their four children – Pramod (5), Pinky (3), Pintu (2) and an infant.

On November 16 1994, the men got into a fracas with Rajnarayan after Pinky accidentally broke the handle of one of their suitcases while playing. It escalated to violence and Rajnarayan had threatened to call the police.

A day later when Prajapati came home from work for lunch, he found the door locked from outside and faint but anguished cries of his wife emanating from inside. He opened the windows only to see his entire family bleeding out after being knifed.

The police said that the accused often used to fight with the Prajapati family over trivial issues. However, on November 16, the trio decided to kill his entire family to teach him a lesson. After the crime, the trio hid the bloodied clothes and knife in their house before fleeing the city.

The Kashimira police had then registered an offence against the three men but the case had gone cold after the accused could not be traced. Last year, the crime branch restarted the investigation after MBVV police Commissionerate came into existence after bifurcation of the Thane rural police force.

Senior officials of the newly-created commissionerate ordered the Crime Branch Unit No. 1 at Kashimira to reopen the case. Police constable Pushpendra Thapa attached to the Unit 1 of the Crime Branch received information about Chauhan in June last year.

Accordingly, a police team was sent to Varanasi. The team spent around 20 days and with the help of Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force, learnt that Chauhan had shifted to Qatar.

The police then got the details of his passport and issued a look out notice for him.