A 25-year-old woman and her 23-year-old friend hailing from West Bengal’s Howrah district were arrested in connection with the murder of a Pune-based businessman in a posh Guwahati hotel on Monday afternoon, police said.

Guwahati police suggested that lust, greed and blackmail led to the fatal incident allegedly involving the duo.

The police said the accused — Anjali Shaw and Vikash Kumar Shaw from Hrishikesh Ghosh Lane in Howrah district — were arrested in the Jalukbari PS Case No 53/24 under IPC sections 302 (murder) and 34 (common intent) around 5.42pm in less than two hours of the duo leaving the hotel “together” to the airport to catch the 9.15pm Indigo flight to Calcutta.

The police received a call from the management of the Radisson Blu Hotel that the guest (Sandeep Suresh Kamble, 44) in Room No 922 “might be sick and that someone should check on him”. But the police found the victim “lying dead in a pool of blood” when they rushed to check on him. The “call” was made by Vikash.

An FIR was lodged on a complaint by the victim’s brother, Vishal, on Tuesday.

Sharing the sequence of events leading to the murder, police claimed the victim — Kamble — was a married businessman from Pune dealing in cars and diamonds. He met Anjali in Calcutta in September last year while on a business trip to the city.

Anjali was a store manager of a restaurant, Saptagiri, at the Netaji Subhash Basu International Airport, Calcutta, police said, adding their “relationship became closer and intimate”. They spent nights “together” in Calcutta and Pune hotels and the deceased used to “send her expensive gifts”, police said. “During such encounters, the victim took some photographs of their intimate moments.... The victim, though married, wanted to marry Anjali and kept on forcing her to break off her relationship with Vikash. Gradually, they fell apart,” the Guwahati police said.

“But the victim became more possessive and started blackmailing her with photographs of their intimate moments. The victim started contacting Anjali’s family members and boyfriend to try to force her to marry him. Kamble also shared the intimated photographs with Vikash,” the police said.

When Anjali could not bear the “regular torture any longer”, she along with her boyfriend “hatched” a plan to meet Sandeep at a hotel and then “snatch” his phones so that the “blackmailing would stop”. When Anjali contacted the victim and asked Kamble to meet in Calcutta he became “suspicious and refused to meet in Calcutta”.

“Instead, the victim agreed to meet in Guwahati as he wanted to visit Kamakya Temple because he met Anjali for the first time when he was on his way back from Guwahati after visiting the temple,” the police said.

“On 05.02.2024, all the three persons came to Guwahati separately. Anjali met Kamble at the LGBI Airport and then left for Radisson Blu Hotel where they checked in at Room No 922. This information was passed on to Vikash by Anjali and he too arrived and checked into Room No 1024,” police claimed.

“At around 2 pm, Vikash entered Anjali and Sandeep’s room as planned. After that, a scuffle ensued between Vikash and the victim. During the scuffle, Sandeep was severely injured and later on died. Founding the victim in an unconscious state profusely bleeding from the nose, they decided to leave the hotel room,” police said.

Around 2:45 pm Anjali and Vikash left the hotel “together” and “decided to catch the flight at 9.15pm on that day where their tickets were pre-booked”. When they were on way to the LGBI airport, they were detained and arrested on Monday.

Police said hotel details of the victim revealed he had checked in with Anjali at around 12:50 pm on Monday.

“On analysis of the CCTV footage of the hotel, it was found the lady had left the room along with another person at around 2:45 pm. When the movement of this third person was tracked in the CCTV footage,” police said.