Hema murder: Cops track Vidyadhar’s relatives across country

MUMBAI: As Vidyadhar Rajbhar, the main accused in the double murder case of artist Hema Upadhyay and her lawyer Haresh Bhambani, still remains at large, the Mumbai

MUMBAI: As Vidyadhar Rajbhar, the main accused in the double murder case of artist Hema Upadhyay and her lawyer Haresh Bhambani, still remains at large, the Mumbai crime branch has started tracking down his relatives across the country.

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After taking over the investigations, the crime branch has visited Gujarat, Indore and Chennai, and shall soon go to Jaipur. The investigating team believes that the accused is into the production of metal idols.

A crime branch official said, “We have gone through his history and learnt that as he specialises in idol making, he will get involved in the business. A team was dispatched to Gujarat, where his sister stays, then later another team was sent to Indore, where his brother-in-law lives and then recently a team visited Chennai, where a big exhibition related to idols takes place every year, suspecting that Vidyadhar might participate in it.”

A team shall soon be visiting Jaipur, where his uncle, who also is in the idol making business, lives. “His whole family is in the same business as his father Vanshraj deals in dispatching idols to different locations across the country, while his sister in Gujarat, brother-in-law in Indore and his uncle are also doing something or the other in the same field,” added the officer.

Vidhyadhar has a wife and an eight-month-old daughter, who have gone back to the wife’s mother’s residence after the murders. “We have checked their call records as well but the accused has never contacted them. The last time we got to trace his location was on February 2, when Vidyadhar had called his brotherin-law to check on the family’s well-being from a different number and a different mobile,” said an officer.

A team was then sent to Chennai. The police could see the accused was slowly moving towards Assam and the mobile phone was switched off on February 10.

“The team traced his location to Assam, but couldn’t find him,” said an officer.