Ghaziabad: To avoid paying alimony, man murders ex-wife on trip to Haridwar

The two got married in 2002 and separated two years later, after which the woman was living with her parents and the suspect Sharma filed for divorce which a court granted in 2014

A 42-year-old man was arrested on Wednesday for luring his ex-wife to take a trip with him and then allegedly murdering her in Haridwar, senior police officers said.

Investigators said he allegedly killed the woman to avoid paying her a monthly maintenance of ₹6,000 and ₹5 lakh lump-sum alimony as directed by a court. (Sakib Ali/HT Photo)

Police identified the suspect as Bhojpur resident Virendra Sharma, alias Sonu, while the deceased was identified as Madhu Sharma, 40, a resident of Modinagar. Investigators said he allegedly killed the woman to avoid paying her a monthly maintenance of ₹6,000 and ₹5 lakh lump-sum alimony as directed by a court.

Senior officers said the two got married in 2002 and separated two years later, after which the woman was living with her parents. They said suspect Sharma filed for divorce, and a court granted the divorce in 2014.

Later, the family of the deceased woman filed a case for grant of maintenance, and the court in September 2024 directed that Sharma pay his ex-wife a monthly maintenance of ₹6,000 and about ₹5 lakh as compensation for previous years, the police said.

Assistant commissioner of police, Modinagar, Gyan Prakash Rai said Manju Sharma, the sister of the deceased woman, approached the police with a missing person complaint on January 23 and said her sister was missing since January 21.

“Later, Manju approached the police again on January 31 and gave a police complaint of kidnapping and murder against her sister’s former husband (the suspect). The police registered an FIR under Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita section 140(1) (kidnapping for murder) against the suspect and formed teams to investigate the matter,” Rai said.

In the FIR, the complainant said her sister left home to go for her work at a boutique in Raj Nagar, Ghaziabad, and never returned.

“When we searched for her, we came to know that her former husband had come in his Swift car near the Oil Mill Road (in Modinagar) and picked her up. She has been missing since,” Sharma said in the FIR lodged at Modinagar police station.

Rai said they arrested the suspect from Saunda Road in Modinagar, and he allegedly admitted to having murdered the woman. Rai said it was to avoid paying her any alimony that Sharma decided to kill his ex-wife.

The suspect started exchanging calls with the woman and lured her for a trip to Chandi Mandir in Haridwar, the ACP said.

“On the day of the incident (January 21), he picked up the woman from Modinagar and took her to Haridwar. There, while on the way back from the temple (located on a hill), he strangled her with her dupatta at a secluded spot and hid the body in the jungle area. The body has been recovered from Haridwar,” ACP Rai said.

The police said that they also recovered the Swift car used by the suspect to take the woman to Haridwar.