Bengaluru: The sensational case of murder of Saurabh Rastogi, an HR executive with a private firm here, has reached its logical conclusion.
Saurabh and Ankisha Rastogi – a happy married life snuffed out
Last year, Rastogi had been murdered by his colleague, Rashwin Chengappa, who was reportedly obsessed with the former’s wife, Ankisha, although older in age.
He kept persuading her to get married to him. Ankisha too worked for the same firm but had resigned her job some time earlier.
Rashwin Chengappa
The Rastogi couple was to relocate to the US last June. This upset Rashwin as he would lose her forever. Therefore he thought that if Saurabh was bumped off, Ankisha would turn to him for support and his marriage plans would materialize.
But she spurned his advances and chided him for his foolish ideas. However, since there were exchanges of WhatsApp and SMS between Ankisha and Rashwin before and after the murder, a finger of suspicion was still pointing at her.
Rashwin arrived at the Sun City apartment of the Rastogis in Iblur on that fateful night of June 14, 2014 when Saurabh was alone and Ankisha was away in Pune. Since he had visited them earlier also, he had no difficulty is getting access to the apartment complex.
Being a colleague, Saurabh welcomed him without suspecting anything. Suddenly, Rashwin pounced on him from behind and stabbed him 18 times with a knife, with the final assault in the abdomen. Then Rashwin had fled the spot.
Ankisha, who had gone to Pune three days earlier, kept calling the husband and his mobile was not being responded. She called the neighbours to check out and also called Rashwin to see why her husband was not responding.
The neighbours did not get any response upon knocking at the door. They informed the police on June 15 morning and they broke the door open, only to find Saurabh lying in a pool of blood.
The exchanges of messages had been deleted by both of them. This made Ankisha also suspect, Besides, every time Rashwin called her up, he used to do so from the vicinity of the apartment. Hence their calls were traced in the same network.
In addition, soon after executing the murder, he had sent her an SMS saying, ‘Work done’. This caused further suspicion regarding her possible role in the killing.
Rashwin had been identified as the visitor and culprit with the help of the CCTV footage at the complex. To put all doubts at rest, the police, besides arresting Rashwin, sent the mobile phones of both of them to the Central Forensic Laboratory in Hyderabad. After 10 months of thorough investigation, it has been found that there was no evidence of expression of love or murder plan in the messages.
The police have reportedly come to a conclusion that she had no hand in the murder. Yet, in the interest of a total and thorough investigation, she could soon be subjected to a narco-test in Gujarat, said police sources.
