Raj mastermind, Raja’s killers planned to kill woman, pass her off as Sonam: Police

The killers of Indore-based businessman Raja Raghuvanshi had a plan to murder any random woman and burn her body to pass it off as that of his wife Sonam so that she could be in hiding for a few more days until the truth was known, a senior police officer of Meghalaya said in state capital Shillong on Thursday.

The police also found out that Sonam's boyfriend Raj Kushwaha was the mastermind in the murder plot and she the co-conspirator.

On the first day of interrogation of Sonam, her suspected boyfriend Raj and three others, who were arrested in connection with the killing of the Indore-based businessman, also revealed that she fled from Meghalaya in a burqa and reached the Madhya Pradesh city using various modes of transport like taxis, buses and trains.

The conspiracy to eliminate Raja was hatched in Indore, shortly before his wedding with Sonam on 11 May, and the mastermind was Kushwaha while Sonam had agreed to the plot, East Khasi Hills district superintendent of police Vivek Syiem told PTI.

A few days after the wedding, Raja (29) and Sonam (24) came to picturesque Sohra in Meghalaya’s East Khasi Hills district and went missing on 23 May. His body was found in a gorge near Weisawdong Falls on 2 June, while a search continued for Sonam.

She emerged in Uttar Pradesh's Ghazipur, around 1,200 km away, in the early hours of 9 June and surrendered. Police have also arrested her boyfriend Kushwaha and three others — Vishal, Akash and Anand — who until now were suspected to have been contract killers.

“The three young people were friends and one of them is a cousin of Raj. It was not a typical contract killing. Yes, the plan was to kill and they did it as a favour to their friend Raj,” Syiem said. Raj had given them Rs 50,000 for the expenditures, he said.

The planning started in February in Indore and they thought of ways about how Sonam would disappear after Raja's death. “One plan was to make people believe she was washed away by a river. Another was to murder a random woman, put her on a two-wheeler, burn the body and claim it was Sonam. However, none of the plans fructified,” the SP said.

The group had arrived a few days before the newly-wed couple reached Assam on 19 May, and had initially planned to eliminate Raja somewhere in Guwahati. Since that did not work for some reason, Sonam planned to go to Shillong and Sohra and as per a prior understanding, all of them met at Nongriat.

Syiem said they started together for Weisawdong Falls, and there all three hit Raja with a machete they bought in Assam and killed him in front of Sonam between 2.00 and 2.18 pm before throwing the body in a gorge.

Sonam gave the raincoat she was wearing to Akash as his shirt had a blood spot. They left Weisawdong on scooters and Akash threw the raincoat later as it too had blood stains. They also abandoned the two-wheeler hired by Sonam and Raja, the SP said.

The police recovered the raincoat and two-wheeler when Sonam was thought to be missing. “Raj had given Vishal a burqa which he handed over to Sonam. She wore it, went to Police Bazaar and took a taxi to Guwahati. From Guwahati, she reached Siliguri (in West Bengal) by bus. From there, she took buses to Patna and Arah and then a train for Lucknow. From Lucknow, Sonam took a bus and reached Indore,” Syiem said.

In the meantime, Meghalaya media interviewed a tour guide who said he had seen Sonam and Raja with three people. Raj told Sonam to leave Indore and emerge somewhere in Siliguri and claim herself as a victim of abduction.

But on 8 June, when Sonam left Indore, two police teams from Meghalaya reached UP and Madhya Pradesh in civil clothes. “When the first arrest (Akash) was made in UP, Raj panicked and told Sonam that wherever she was, to call her family and tell them she had just escaped from an abduction gang. That's how this whole thing came to light in Ghazipur,” Syiem said.

They had thought that Raja's body would not be discovered as the spot was remote and the police enquiry would take one to two months. So she thought of playing the victim card.

“We are recording their statements. We are questioning them. Once we get a clear picture — as the accused have been kept separately — we will gather evidence and reconstruct the crime scene,” Syiem said.

The officer said he is confident that the police will file a charge sheet in the case within the mandatory 90 days.

All five were remanded to eight days of police custody on Wednesday.

Deputy inspector-general of police D.N.R. Marak told PTI that the SIT (special investigation team) conducting the probe into the murder is seeking assistance from police in Assam and other states to link all evidence in the case.

According to him, the police are verifying if any of the accused had made a recce of Sohra and the jungles of Nongriat beforehand.