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Had renowned Mumbai-based artist Hema Upadhyay survived the murder attempt on her, she would have escaped being stuffed into a wooden coffin and her body being dumped into a sewer. Had she lived, she would have been 45 years old today, probably still scaling heights in the art world.
But a helpless Hema succumbed to the premeditated attack, allegedly masterminded by her husband, Chintan Upadhyay, also a known figure in the art world. Even though Chintan was arrested soon after the crime in December 2015, uncertainty continues to loom over the fate of Vidyadhar Rajbhar, a fabrication workshop owner.
Rajbhar allegedly committed the crime at the behest of Chintan, killing Hema and her lawyer, Haresh Bhambhani, in a case of double murder that shocked the country.
A fugitive for one and a half years now, Rajbhar has left investigators perplexed. He is the crucial missing link in the case – the link which can establish Chintan’s guilt, and prove that he was the one who had masterminded the double murder.
But even as investigators optimistically, yet inconsequentially, trace every new lead that pops up, the trail seems to be getting colder, and Hema’s relatives believe that it is Chintan’s supporters who are backing Rajbhar’s fugitive life.
A 36-year-old businessman residing in Navi Mumbai, Menon still attends all the hearings concerning the case, and is the family’s spokesperson.
Menon added,
Vidyadhar Rajbhar’s last location, according to the Mumbai police, was the Chennai-Coimbatore highway. That was one and a half months after the double murder. Ever since, several police teams have spanned out across India, Rajbhar’s hometown has been tapped, his wife and relatives have been kept under surveillance, his phone is being constantly monitored, however, to no avail.
Exasperated and doubtful that he could sustain such a long escape, the cops, in October 2016, figured he must be dead. Several mortuaries across the country were subsequently scanned but he could not be found. Without Rajbhar’s corpse, the law says he’s still alive, and so is the wild goose hunt for him.
Menon stated that he also scoured several holy places across the country, including Shirdi and Tirupati, since fugitives, after committing crimes as heinous as murders, are known to visit temples to ask for forgiveness. But these efforts turned out to be futile as well.
Investigators, when Rajbhar first escaped, were sure of nabbing him. They had two reasons to believe so – he had only a few thousand rupees on his person when we escaped and would soon run out of money; he would want to contact his wife since she had given birth to a baby girl only two months before the murders.
But Rajbhar has successfully sustained his run. Even as the police laid a trap around October 2016 near his house, hoping that he would show up to see his baby girl on her first birthday, Rajbhar refrained from the emotional indulgence. He knew it could cost him his fragile freedom.
The Mumbai police, in March 2017, got a notification from a cell phone network provider saying that Rajbhar’s phone was on, and being used somewhere in Chennai – closer to his last known location. A police team was immediately dispatched to nab him. However, it was learnt that someone else was using the phone.
The only complaint Menon has with the Mumbai police is about the double murder case being transferred to the Crime Branch from the Kandivli police. He said:
Remembering Hema on her birthday, Menon said:
Bodies of Hema Upadhyay and her lawyer, Haresh Bhambani, were found stuffed in wooden boxes, abandoned in a suburban sewer on 12 December 2015. Immediately after the murders came to light, four men, all employees of 26-year-old Rajbhar, were placed under arrest. Chintan was also arrested on charges of masterminding the crime. The accused are currently awaiting trial.
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