Woman who married Dalit man killed, buried on family farm by brothers: cops

Chandni Kashyap and Arjun Kumar

The Delhi Police has arrested a 32-year-old man for allegedly killing his 23-year-old sister and burying the body in the family’s farm in Uttar Pradesh’s Mainpuri district after she married a Dalit man despite the family’s disapproval, the police said on Saturday.

The victim has been identified as Chandni Kashyap. She lived in Trilokpuri, East Delhi, with her husband, Arjun Kumar, 25, who works at a private firm in the national capital.

According to the police, Chandni’s brothers Sunil (32), Sushil (28) and Sudhir (26) met her in Delhi on November 17 and took her back home to Mainpuri. On November 20, she was shot dead, allegedly by her brothers, who then buried the body in the farm, the police said.

On November 22, Arjun submitted a complaint to Delhi Police, stating that his wife had been kidnapped. Nearly three weeks on, the body was exhumed on Friday night and sent for postmortem.

DCP (East Delhi) Jasmeet Singh told The Sunday Express, “A case under IPC Section 365 (kidnapping) was registered at Mayur Vihar police station when the complaint was received from the victim’s husband. A team was sent to Mainpuri. During investigation, it was found that she had been killed. We have now added IPC Section 302 (murder) to the FIR.”

One accused – one of her brothers – has been arrested, DCP Singh said. Efforts are on to nab the other two accused, an officer said.

The victim came from Kashyapnagar village in Kisni, Mainpuri district. Senior Sub-Inspector Jacob Fernandez of Kisni told The Sunday Express, “Kashyap got married against the wishes of her family in June. The family objected since they belong to the OBC category, while her husband Arjun is a Dalit. We helped the Delhi Police team exhume the body on Friday evening. We are awaiting the postmortem report.”

A Delhi Police officer said, in Mainpuri, “her family members there couldn’t give a proper response. Villagers were also asked. Some of them said she was brought home, but that no one had seen her for a few days. When the family was interrogated, her brother confessed to having killed her and then buried the body in their field.”

The officer said that during interrogation, the accused said they had taken her back to Mainpuri on the pretext of a casual visit to fix the tense relationship.
Arjun Kumar, who on Saturday night was on way back to Delhi after performing his wife’s last rites in Mainpuri, said her body bore gunshot wounds.

He said they had met eight years ago: “She lived near my house. We got married on June 12 in Pratapgarh, UP, where I come from. Since I belong to a lower caste, her family did not accept our marriage. Her brothers took her to Mainpuri on November 17, saying she should visit for a couple of days and that they need to make some payments for construction work, and that she should accompany them to the village.”

“After she left Delhi, I could not get in touch with her and had called her cousin, the family lied,” he said. “The cousin told me she committed suicide. Another relative said she got married to someone else, while a third relative said she had returned to Delhi.”

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