UP: Wife, her family strangle man to death, hang body to stage suicide; arrested

Bareilly (UP), Feb 1 (PTI) A man was allegedly strangled to death by his wife while her parents and brother held him down, and his body was later hanged from a window grill with a muffler to make it appear like suicide, officials here said on Sunday.

The woman and her parents were arrested after the postmortem report suggested strangulation to be the cause of death, ruling out suicide, they said.

According to Circle Officer (CO) Pankaj Srivastava, the body of Jitendra Kumar Yadav (33), a native of Bhaupora in Etawah district, was found hanging at his rented house under Izzat Nagar police station area here on January 26.

Jitendra, a contract employee at the Indian Veterinary Research Institute (IVRI), was living at the house in Girja Shankar Colony, Kailashpuram, with his wife Jyoti.

Initially, the death was reported as suicide. However, based on a complaint filed by the deceased's brother Ajay Kumar, a case was registered against Jyoti and three others for abetment to suicide, and a postmortem examination was conducted.

"The postmortem report confirmed that the cause of death was strangulation," the CO said, adding that the accused were subsequently charged with murder.

Police arrested Jyoti, her father Kalicharan and her mother Chameli, residents of Durga Nagar locality, on Saturday. Jyoti's brother Deepak is also an accused and efforts are on to trace him, police said.

During interrogation, Jyoti allegedly told police that she and Jitendra had known each other since their student days and later married last year with the consent of their families. Jitendra was working on a contract basis at IVRI, while Jyoti was employed as a contract bus conductor with the Uttar Pradesh road transport corporation, police said.

She claimed that frequent altercations over financial matters led to bitterness between the couple.

During one such quarrel, she informed her parents, following which her father, mother and brother reached the house.

Jyoti confessed that during the scuffle, her parents and brother held Jitendra's hands and legs, while she strangled him in a fit of rage, police said.

After he stopped responding, the family allegedly tied his body with a muffler to the window grill to stage a suicide, and then raised an alarm to mislead neighbours, police said, adding that a detailed probe is on in the matter. PTI COR ABN ARB ARB