Robbers murder elderly couple in East of Kailash

An elderly couple was smothered to death early on Friday by suspected robbers at their East of Kailash residence, where they lived with their two sons on separate floors.

An elderly couple was smothered to death early on Friday by suspected robbers at their East of Kailash residence, where they lived with their two sons on separate floors.

An elderly couple was smothered to death early on Friday by suspected robbers at their East of Kailash residence in New Delhi. (Saumya Khandelwal/ HT Photo)

Police said Manohar Lal Madan (85), a retired bank official, and his wife Vimla (79) were sleeping in a ground floor room when the assailants broke into their three-storey house.

They tried to raise an alarm but the robbers gagged them with pieces of cloth and smothered them with pillows.

The incident was reported around 2:15am when the robbers proceeded to the first floor where the couple’s youngest son Sanjay lived with his family.

Police said Sanjay was woken up by the flash of a torchlight on his face and alerted his 19-year-old daughter after hearing footsteps.

“The robbers escaped before the family could catch them. Sanjay went to alert his parents and found them dead. He took them to the hospital where they were declared dead on arrival,” a police officer said, adding that the house had been ransacked.