Cops suspect brother of accused husband present during Gurugram woman’s murder

On October 27, Deepika Chauhan, assistant vice-president of a private bank in Cyber City, died after falling from the balcony of her apartment in Valley View Estate condominium. The police have arrested her husband Vikram Singh Chauhan and his paramour Shefali Bhasin Tiwari in connection with the case.

Two days after the police arrested a 35-year-old woman for allegedly conspiring with her lover to kill his wife, the Gurugram police, on Thursday, said the brother of the accused husband has gone missing. The police said he is suspected to have been with the victim’s husband when the latter allegedly pushed her from the balcony of their eighth floor apartment on the night of Karvachauth.

A view of Valley View Estate building on Gurugram-Faridabad Road. Deepika Chauhan, a resident, was allegedly pushed off the balcony of her eighth floor flat by her husband on October 27. (HT Photo)

On October 27 at 9.37 pm, Deepika Chauhan, assistant vice-president of a private bank in Cyber City, had died after falling from the balcony of her apartment in Valley View Estate condominium. The police had arrested Vikram Singh Chauhan, a senior executive of a private company, and booked him for murder the following day.

His paramour, Shefali Bhasin Tiwari, was arrested on Tuesday after the police had perused through their conversations on Google Talk, detailing a conspiracy to murder Deepika including a failed attempt to push her off a cliff in Nainital, two days before the incident. Investigators probing the case had said that at 7.43 pm on that day, Shefali had sent a message to Vikram that read, “Balcony se phek do (Throw her from the balcony)”.

Sanjeev Kumar, DLF Phase-1 station house officer (SHO), who cracked the case, said that the probe had revealed that Vikram’s brother, Amit, who works at a private company, was also complicit and suspected to be present when the woman was pushed from the balcony.

“Since the arrest of Shefali, the brother of the accused has been on the run. A police team had gone to his house and office locations, but could not trace him. His mobile phone is switched off,” said Kumar, adding that the police would round him up for questioning.

Deepika’s last conversation with her brother

The victim’s brother on Thursday said that minutes before the incident, Deepika had told him over text messages that things were “not fine” and that she was thinking of revealing to her parents about her husband’s alleged extra marital affair.

“For the past few months, I had been renting a room in a different tower of the same condominium and usually ate dinner at her place. On October 26, when they returned from Nainital, Vikram and Deepika fought when I had gone for dinner. On the Karvachauth day, she did not call or text me. I found it strange. When I called to check at 9.27 pm, she disconnected my call and sent a text message asking me to manage dinner elsewhere,” said Himanshu Ahuja, Deepika’s brother.

He said when he replied asking if she was fine, she told him that she was going to tell her parents about Vikram’s affair with Shefali.

“Till then, she had only confided in me about her marital problems. In her last text message sent minutes before she was murdered, she had asked me to delete our conversation,” said Himanshu.

Himanshu also alleged that after Deepika was taken to the hospital, Vikram had tried to delete some messages from her mobile phone and was reluctant to hand over her mobile phone when he had asked for it.

SHO Kumar said the victim’s phone was a case property and the police team was probing if any incriminating messages were deleted from her phone shortly after the incident took place, as alleged by her brother.