The murders happened in the last week of May 2015. The bodies of Aishwarya Priyadarshini (13) and Jayakrishna Prabhu (11) were found in a decomposed state in June and Ravi was found absconding. While Ravi was practising in Poonamalee court, his wife was a lawyer in Chidambaram.

Though police found his digital footprints in Odisha and Delhi, they could not nab him in the last five years.

Ravi had hit his daughter with a sharp object on May 26, the day of her birthday and then strangulated his son and left their bodies on the bedroom with clothes thrown around. He had left a candle lit besides leaving the cooking gas cylinder on, hoping for a fake fire mishap but lack of cooking gas in the cylinder foiled his plan.

Since he routinely left kids locked in the house, nobody suspected any foul play until bad smell started emitting from the apartment on June 3.

Ravi, by then, had left the city for AP and then to Odisha, where he sold his car and started life as a construction worker. He returned to the city in January and was staying at a construction site when police caught him.

Well versed with police functioning, Ravi made sure that he never used his mobile number and tried to assume new identity but finally had to come back to Chennai and stay here due to lockdown. Police got a breakthrough when somebody known to him made contact at a school where his daughter was studying, seeking some documents related to her.