Shraddha Walkar Murder: Forensic Reports Submitted, Post-Mortem To Be Conducted

Aaftab Poonawala and Shraddha Walkar.

(Photo: Altered by The Quint)

Over a month after the Shraddha Walkar murder case made headlines, the Delhi Police has said that body parts recovered from the jungles of Mehrauli will be sent for "post-mortem." The post-mortem is most likely to be conducted at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Delhi.

Sagar Preet Hooda, Special Commisioner of Police, Law and Order, on Thursday, 15 December, said:

"Police have received both (DNA and polygraph test) reports. This will help police in further investigation. The recovered body remains will be sent for post-mortem examination. The probe is underway."

Sagar Preet Hooda, Special Commisioner of Police, Law and Order.

He added that the reports were received from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL).

Meanwhile, a senior Delhi Police officer told The Quint, "It's been a positive development for us. It shows that our investigation is going in the right direction."

The DNA extracted from bone pieces recovered in the Mehrauli forest area by the Delhi Police has matched with samples of Walkar's father, police sources were quoted as saying by news agency PTI.

Further, Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena has approved the police's proposal for the appointment of special public prosecutors, to represent the State in the murder case.

Advocates Madhukar Pandey and Amit Prasad will now represent Delhi Police as special public prosecutors in the matter.

Poonawala allegedly murdered his live-in partner of three years in May this year and then chopped her body into at least 35 pieces. After storing them in a fridge at their rented Chhattarpur house, the 28-year-old allegedly disposed of the parts at various locations in Delhi over a span of two months. 

The matter came to the fore in November after Delhi Police arrested Poonawala, two months after Walkar's father Vikas had registered a missing person's complaint with the Mumbai police. The couple had moved from Mumbai to Delhi in May.

Investigation So Far

The Delhi Police had earlier conducted a polygraph test and a narco-analysis test on Poonawala to better establish the motive, suspecting that he was lying to mislead the police.

Police teams have conducted searches at Mehrauli forest, the flat in Chhatarpur where the crime allegedly took place, Gurugram, Maharashtra, Uttarakhand's Dehradun, and some parts of Himachal Pradesh.

The accused, who was employed at a call centre in Gurugram at the time of his arrest, is suspected to have discarded the body parts and the weapon on his way to work at night.

After the searches, more than 13 body parts, mostly skeletal remains, including a jaw and a femur bone, were recovered from several locations.

All the collected evidence was sent for forensic analysis to determine whether they were human bones and if they indeed were Walkar’s. DNA samples from her father and brother were also collected to match the same.

Police officers had told The Quint at the time of Poonwala's arrest that the couple allegedly fought over financial issues, and over Walkar's suspicion of Poonwala's infidelity. A senior police officer had said that Poonwala had allegedly strangled Walkar to death on 18 May, before chopping her body into pieces and discarding them.

Till August, no missing person's complaint was filed as Walkar was barely in touch with her father, who went to the police after her friends raised alarm that she had not responded to their messages.