Hyderabad: Police cracks severed woman’s head case, suspect arrested

HYDERABAD: The Malakpet police successfully solved the mysterious case of a severed woman’s head, which was discovered near the banks of Musi River at Thigalaguda on May 17. A suspect has been apprehended in connection with the crime on Wednesday.

The victim, Yerram Anuradha Reddy (55), was a widow and resided in Chaitanyapuri colony, Dilsukhnagar. She had been in a relationship with the accused, B Chandra Mohan (48), who also lived in Chaitanyapuri.

On May 17, a complaint was filed by a worker of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) after discovering the decapitated head of an unidentified woman in a black-colored cover. The worker immediately alerted the police.

In response to the incident, eight teams were formed to investigate the case. The teams undertook various measures, including round-the-clock scrutiny of CCTV footage from May 10 to May 17, searching the DARPAN app for missing persons, gathering details of all missing cases from 735 Police Stations in Telangana, contacting the CID, Woman Safety Wing, SCRB, and NCRB for intelligence exchange, and conducting identity inquiries by showing the deceased’s photo in nearby areas such as Chaderghat, Kahchiguda, Saidabad, Amberpet, Santoshnagar, and Kanchanbagh. Additionally, information was shared with all State police headquarters across India. According to the police, the accused, who is unmarried, had an illicit relationship with the victim, Anuradha Reddy, for 15 years.

Anuradha had been residing in a portion of his ground-floor house. In 2018, Chandra borrowed a significant sum of approximately Rs 7 lakhs from her, but despite her repeated requests, he failed to repay the amount. Subsequently, he devised a plan to eliminate her. On May 12, during an argument over the outstanding debt, he attacked her with a knife, inflicting fatal stabs to her chest and stomach, which led to her death.

Afterwards, the accused purchased two stone-cutting machines to sever the head from the torso. He stored the head in a black polythene cover, while the legs and hands were separated from the body using the machine.

The legs and hands were preserved in a refrigerator, while the torso was kept in a suitcase for disposal, explained CH Rupesh, DCP of the South East Zone. Additionally, the accused used phenyl, Dettol, perfume agarbatti, and perfume spray bottles to regularly apply them to the body parts of the deceased, intending to prevent the smell from spreading in the vicinity, added the DCP.