A month on, cops crack murder of man found dead outside Juinagar station

The Navi Mumbai crime branch found the body of the 25-year-old victim on November 20 in a dried up drain opposite the Juinagar station

NAVI MUMBAI: Nearly a month after an unidentified man was found unconscious near the Juinagar railway station, the police have cracked the man’s murder and identified the victim and the accused.

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The Navi Mumbai crime branch found the body of 25-year-old Qadir Karam Hussain Sheikh, a resident of Mandala on November 20, in a dried up drain opposite the Juinagar station. Sheikh was rushed to the NMMC Hospital in Vashi, where doctors declared him dead. Initially, police treated the case as an accidental death, but the post-mortem revealed severe head injuries caused by a blow from a blunt object, ruling out an accident. After the police found that the man’s injuries were the result of a violent assault, they launched a murder investigation.

With the case now classified as a murder, three teams from the crime branch scanned CCTV footage from the surrounding areas, and conducted door-to-door inquiries. Police officers tried to retrace the victim’s movements, speak to the people he had interacted with, and understand what might have led to the assault.

During inquiries in the Juinagar–Sanpada stretch, the police learned of a recent confrontation between Sheikh and a local resident, later identified as 27-year-old Raju Jabbar Mandal, who lives in a makeshift settlement near the Juinagar parking area. “Two people familiar with both men told police that a personal dispute had escalated sharply days before the incident,” said a police officer.

Following this lead, police detained Mandal, and when he was questioned on December 11, he confessed to attacking Sheikh with a stone after a heated dispute involving his wife. The Nerul police have registered a murder case under section 103(1) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).