The mother and son arrested by Salt Lake police after a charred skeleton was found on their rooftop told policemen that they used a grinding stone to kill the eldest son of the family and then burnt his body using a combination of ghee and camphor to mask the smell, a police officer said.
Geeta Mahensariya and her younger son Vidur, 22, were produced before a Salt Lake court on Friday on murder charges as well as destroying evidence.
The court sent them to five-day police custody.
Geeta and her younger son Vidur were arrested on Thursday night after a police team probing a missing complaint lodged by her estranged husband, Anil Kumar Mahensariya, landed at the two-storey house in AJ Block.
The cops are also probing the role of Geeta and Anil’s daughter.
According to an officer of Bidhannagar commissionerate, Geeta and Vidur were questioned for hours on Thursday night. Initially they told cops that they knew nothing about the skeleton but broke down during the questioning. “They told us that they killed Arjun by hitting him on the head using a grinding stone used to pound spices. They burnt his body using a combination of ghee and camphor so that the smell did not alert neighbours,” said the officer.
The officer added that the initial forensic report indicated that the bone structure of the skeleton was that of a young male.
According to the officer, they had found some burnt remnants of clothes on the first floor and there were ashes and other charred remains on the flight of stairs leading to the roof. “It seems that they had used a large cauldron to burn the body on the first floor. They wrapped up the remains in a bedsheet and carried it to the roof.”
Geeta used to stay in the two-storey AJ Block house with Arjun, Vidur and her daughter while her estranged husband Anil was staying at an apartment in Rajarhat since August 2019.
According to an officer, they are also trying to find out the exact motive behind the killing. “We are probing every angle of this case.”
Anil Kumar Mahensariya had taken an office space in central Calcutta for Arjun to start a business but he had stopped sending money for Vidur and his daughter’s education, said the officer.
Both Geeta and Vidur were produced before a Salt Lake court on Friday.
There were charged under various sections of the IPC including 302 (murder), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence, or giving false information to screen offender) among others.
Inside the court, Sabir Ali the public prosecutor, said that police custody was required as the two would be needed by the cops for crime scene reconstruction in the days to come.
“The police also need to question them in custody,” Ali said.
The defence lawyer of Geeta and Vidur, on the other hand, said Geeta has been suffering from psychiatric issues for the past several years and was on medication.
