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Dadri deaths: Woman’s extraordinary revenge plot leads to intrigue, murder
According to police, she crafted an elaborate plan to kill the four people — all distant relatives whom she held responsible for her parents’ deaths, who died by suicide in May 2021.
New Delhi When her parents died by suicide in Dadri in May 2021, Payal Bhati’s stoicism surprised her relatives and neighbours. She spoke little and didn’t shed a tear, even at their funeral. She broke her silence only twice — the first time to ask for an update in the police investigation into the suicides, and the second time to chide her two brothers for not thinking about avenging the deaths.
“She was our father’s favourite child, so we were surprised she didn’t mourn publicly,” said her older brother, Arun Bhati. Their parents — Ravindra Bhatiand Rakesh Bhati— killed themselves on May 17 last year after being unable to bear the humiliation heaped on them by a distant cousin and his relatives over an unpaid loan of ₹5 lakh. The sudden tragedy plunged the family into crisis. But what went unnoticed in the chaos was the anger and vengeance coursing through Payal, said police.
“For months, she kept running multiple plans in her mind. She was holding her tears back for an unimaginable revenge,” said Saad Miya Khan, additional deputy commissioner of police (central Noida).
Over the next one year, police say she crafted an elaborate plan to kill the four people — all distant relatives whom she held responsible for her parents’ deaths — but there was a hitch: investigators would immediately see her (and her brothers) as the prime suspects, given the frosty ties between the two wings of the family over the outstanding loan.
To circumvent this, she allegedly decided on a gruesome feint — allegedly killing a 28-year-old woman with physical similarities, and passing herself off as dead. For good measure, she also planned to kill her accomplice in the crime, a man she met and fell in love with online in 2020, police added.
The first half of the plot worked well. Police say that she killed Greater Noida resident Hema Chaudhary on November 12 and made it look like suicide. Her heartbroken family accepted this, thinking she must have been depressed after her parents’ sudden passing, even as Payal went underground. But a small slip by her alleged accomplice — showing he used his registered phone number to call Chaudhary — nixed their plan, unveiled the extraordinary plot the two people had hatched, and, in the process, saved the lives of four people, added police.
“But for that mistake and police’s investigation, she would have killed five more persons,” said Khan.
The loan repayment
Last year, 22-year-old Payal graduated from a college in Ghaziabad with a degree in Arts and was keen on a career in the army, said her uncle, Devendra. She spent most of her free time at her two-storey house in Badhpura village watching soap operas, from which she allegedly derived her revenge plot, said police. “She hardly had friends, she spent a lot of time on social media,” said her younger brother Ajay. The family lived off the earnings of her father, Ravindra Bhati,who was a journalist for 26 years before he and his older son, Arun, took up desk jobs with an airline services firm.
But the spectre of the loan repayment to distant cousin Sunil Nagar hung over their heads, said police. The loan was taken by her parents in 2019 for Arun’s marriage. “Our inability to quickly return the money led to Nagar harassing us and threatening to implicate my father in a fake rape case,” Arun alleged, adding that the harassment ranged from death threats to public humiliation.
Allegedly aiding Nagar were his cousin and Arun’s wife, Swati, and her two brothers, Kaushendra Singh and Golu Singh, said Arun in his police complaint. This took a toll on Arun’s married life as well — Swati moved away early last year.
“The alleged threats and public humiliation were too much for Payal’s parents. On May 17 last year, the couple died by consuming pesticide,” said Anil Rajpoot, station house officer (SHO) of Bisrakh police station in Greater Noida. An abetment to suicide case was registered at Dadri police station against Nagar — along with Arun’s wife Swati, and her two brothers Kaushalendra and Golu, for allegedly helping Nagar in the loan recovery. But no arrests were made. “The suspects were granted bail by courts in the subsequent weeks,” added Umesh Bahadur, Dadri SHO.
Nagar denied all charges. “I didn’t even ask them back for my money. They died because of shock after Arun’s wife Swati left him,” he added.
The Revenge plan
Early this year, Payal overheard from relatives that a compromise was being brokered between the two wings of the family over the suicide complaint, said Devendra. By that time, she had ostensibly sunk into depression, had made two attempts to end her life, and would often post sad updates on social media, said Khan. She had also grown increasingly isolated from her family. “She probably thought we didn’t do enough for our parents,” said Arun.
Payal allegedly started to renew her friendship with Ajay Thakur, a 28-year-old Bulandshahr resident she first befriended on Facebook in 2020. A married man with two children, Thakur worked for a motorcycle firm in Greater Noida and commuted to work daily. Payal didn’t know Thakur was already married, said police. It is to Thakur that Payal first confided her macabre plan to exact revenge. “Payal needed someone to help her kill the people she held responsible,” said Khan.
By the end of 2021, Payal and Thakur were thick. “Thakur was willing to leave his wife and children to marry Payal. Once Payal was sure of his loyalty, she promised to marry him if he could kill Nagar for her,” said SHO Rajpoot.
Thakur allegedly procured a gun and a dozen bullets. Investigators said that between July and September, Thakur and Payal would often ride a motorcycle to stalk Nagar who worked as a compounder at a clinic in Noida.But two attempts — in August and September — were foiled due to the presence of witnesses, said Upendra Kumar, the investigating officer (IO).
“Payal then realised that she would have to take the lead,” said Rajpoot. It is at this point that she decided to also kill Swati, Kaushendra and Golu, Rajpoot added.
But there was one problem.
“If she killed them all, she would fall under suspicion. To avoid getting arrested, she decided to convince the world that she was dead. So strong was her desire for revenge that she was willing to sever all ties with her family and begin a new life under a new identity,” said Khan.
Payal allegedly discussed her idea with Thakur, who agreed to join her to pursue a new life. Police said he was likely motivated by the lengthy procedure of legally separating from his wife.
The hapless victim
Payal and Thakur allegedly decided to find a dead body with a physique and complexion similar to hers.“For a few days, Thakur tried to visit mortuaries in search of a body, but without a concrete plan of stealing the body,” said the IO.
When they hit a dead end in early October, Payal allegedly proposed killing someone who looked like her. “Thakur would scout women’s social media profiles, and visit markets and malls in search for a fair-complexioned woman of medium build and around 5’2 height,” Kumar said.
Early November, Thakur stumbled upon a woman at the Gaur City Mall in Greater Noida. Hema Chaudhary was a salesperson in a garments store. Originally from Hathras, Chaudhary was estranged from her husband and lived with her sister in Greater Noida’s Surajpur. Her seven-year-old son stayed with her parents. “The only fault of my sister was that she had the same physique and complexion as Payal,” said Chaudhary’s sister, Mamtesh.
Thakur struck up a friendship with Chaudhary. On November 12, he picked her up from Surajpur and they rode together to Payal’s house in Badhpura. To ensure that the coast was clear, Payal drugged her family by crushing 20 sleeping pills and mixing them with their dinner, said Rajpoot.
Around 11pm, Chaudhary and Thakur walked into the house and made their way to the terrace, where Payal, armed with a knife, lay in wait, said police. “As soon as Hema opened the terrace door, Thakur restrained her. Payal sprang from the dark and stabbed Hema twice in her neck,” said Khan.
They allegedly stripped Chaudhary and dressed her in Payal’s clothes, slit her wrists, disfigured her face and neck, dragged her body to the prayer room next to the photos of Payal’s parents, and left a suicide note. “Addressed to her brothers, the note mentioned that Payal accidentally spilled hot oil on her face, that she would struggle to marry with a disfigured face and was slitting her wrists to save her family from any embarrassment,” said Rajpoot.
By 1am, Payal and Thakur had left the house, for a new life of anonymity and crime, said police.
The body was discovered around 3am when the family woke up to feed their cattle. “There was no reason to suspect that it was someone else’s body. The explanation for the suicide made sense,” said Arun. Later that day, the body was cremated. Police was never called. No foul play was suspected.
The unravelling
The unmarried couple struggled to rent a place in Bulandshahr. Thrice they came close to killing Nagar, but failed due to unexpected public presence, said Khan. Pestered frequently by their landowner to produce a marriage certificate, the duo wed in a Ghaziabad temple on November 27.
By then, however, Chaudhary’s family had begun searching for her in earnest. On November 15, police registered a missing person’s complaint at Bisrakh station, and started poring over her call records. One number jumped out at them.
This number — which police say belonged to Thakur — was the last dialled number. Police later said Thakur slipped when he used his registered number to call Chaudhary because he believed that no one would seriously pursue her disappearance.
Thakur’s number was switched off but the last-known location of both his and Chaudhary’s phone showed them at the same spot — in Surajpur. Because Thakur’s wife, XXX (NAME), had also filed a police complaint after he didn’t return home, police already had his details.
From there, the plan collapsed dramatically. In the last week of November, Thakur was traced to Bulandshahr. On December 1, police intercepted him and Payal on a motorcycle near Gaur City Mall. They had on them a gun, a knife, and bullets, said police.
HT reached out to a relative and a family friend of Thakur’s for comments, but didn’t get a response.
Payal’s family is still in shock. “We thought the police were bluffing that Payal was alive. We froze when we she appeared before us. We didn’t know whether to be happy that she was alive, or weep that she was again being separated from us,” said Ajay.
Payal, on the other hand, showed no remorse. According to Arun, she calmly looked at her brothers and said, “This was revenge for our parents.”
Officers who interrogated Payal said her future plans still involved joining the army. “But Thakur didn’t feature in her future plans. She told us that she would have eventually killed Thakur as his presence exposed her to potential blackmail,” said Rajpoot.
She is now looking at a life in jail.
