A woman, her lover and two others were arrested for murdering her husband who was a migrant from Bihar, a year ago and spinning a story around his disappearance saying he was working in Dubai. The four had conspired and killed the man identified as Mohammad Israel Akbarali Ansari alias Sameer Bihari, who made a living as a mason in Ahmedabad, burying his body in the kitchen floor of the house and covering it with tiles.
On Tuesday morning, residents of Ahmadi Row House in the Fatewadi area of Ahmedabad were puzzled when a large team of police personnel reached their society with several workers with spades, shovels and pickaxes and went into house number A/6. They soon realised that their former neighbour, Ansari, was not in Dubai as his wife, Ruby, allegedly claimed, but was dead and buried in the house.
Police sources said that it is suspected that Ruby lived in the house where her husband was murdered for a few weeks and then moved elsewhere with her two children.
The house was locked when a crime branch team reached there to exhume the body in the presence of an executive magistrate.
Imran Vaghela, who was allegedly in an extramarital relationship with Ansari’s wife Ruby and is a key accused in Ansari’s murder, was arrested on Tuesday. Ansari’s wife Ruby alias Priya Bihari, Rahim alias Sahil Salim Shaikh and Mohsin alias Faizu Nazirkhan Pathan were arrested on Wednesday.
After an investigation that spanned three-and-a half months, the Detection of Crime Branch (DCB) of the Ahmedabad City Police uncovered a crime that had gone unnoticed for more than a year.
Police Inspector SJ Jadeja said that one of the police personnel was told about the suspicion of the murder by his informant, possibly revealed to him by one of the accused persons.
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Inspector Jadeja and his team, on the basis of a tip-off regarding the possible murder, kept a watch on the house and made enquiries about the time when Ansari and Ruby lived there on rent. After confirming their suspicions, they went to the house and dug up the kitchen floor to find human remains – flesh, bones and a skull – embedded in cement.
The police are certain that these are Ansari’s mortal remains because along with the executive magistrate and witnesses, one more man was standing at the site – Imran Akbar Vaghela – the man accused of slitting Ansari’s throat before burying the body. The police picked up Vaghela during the inquiry after they came to know that Ruby entered into an extramarital relationship with him.
Forensic examination and DNA sampling of the recovered human remains are underway, police said.
According to the police, the main motive for the murder was that Ansari used to allegedly subject his wife to domestic abuse.
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DCP (Crime) Ajit Rajian said on Wednesday, “The Crime Branch received information that Ansari alias Sameer Bihari, residing in the Sarkhej Fatehwadi Canal area, was murdered a year ago by his wife and Imran Vaghela. Imran Vaghela was brought to the Crime Branch for interrogation.”
DCP Rajian said, “Vaghela admitted to the crime and pointed out the location where the body was buried. During the process of exhuming the body in the presence of an executive magistrate, remains were found.”
All four accused have been booked under BNS sections for murder, destruction of evidence, and criminal conspiracy, in the FIR filed at DCB police station on November 4 on the basis of a complaint by Inspector S J Jadeja on behalf of the state.
During investigation, the police found that Ansari was a mason who hailed from Rampur village in Bihar’s Siwan district. He married Ruby in 2015-2016, moved to Gujarat and allegedly severed ties with his family, which is possibly why nobody filed a missing person’s report for him in over a year of his disappearance.
