UP: Doctor kills wife, cremates body 400 kilometers away; arrested
A horrific case of murder has come to the fore in Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur Kheri after the police arrested an ayurvedic doctor for allegedly killing his wife Vandana, also a doctor. Officials said the incident happened on November 26 following the doctor couple had a fight. They said the accused later cremated the victim's body quietly nearly 400 kilometers away, they added, TOI reported.
Accused confessed to the crime
Police told NDTV that the accused was arrested and questioned by police on Monday, following which he reportedly confessed to the crime. They later revealed that the accused along with his father murdered the victim with a heavy object. The accused have been identified as Abhishek Awasthi and his father Gauri Shankar. They have been arrested now.
Accused kept the body in a suitcase
Police said Awasthi secretly cremated his wife's body in Garhmukteshwar, some 400 kilometers away, after murdering her. Awasthi, an Ayurvedic doctor, later filed a 'missing complaint' at Kotwali Sadar police station following the incident. "Awasthi kept the body in a suitcase and called an ambulance and cremated the body nearly 400 km away in Garh Mukteshwar," said Arun Kumar Singh, ASP, Kheri.
Marital discord of doctor couple
Per police, Vandana (28) married Awasthi, a resident of Mohalla Bahadurnagar in Lakhimpur city, in 2014. They said the couple started practicing Ayurvedic medicine at Gauri Chikitsalaya, a hospital they founded on Sitapur Road. However, the couple started fighting each other and the marital dispute gradually worsened. Later, Vandana opted to practice in a separate hospital in Chamalpur, according to the police.
Similar incident reported in the past
In a similar event in June, a 47-year-old man killed his wife in a food dispute in Delhi's Sultanpur neighborhood. According to officials, the accused Vinod Kumar Dubey killed his wife after an argument occurred when she refused to give him food after both of them had consumed alcohol. The accused later slept with the body, unaware that she was dead, they had said.
Crime rate in Uttar Pradesh
Statistics in the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) from August, UP reported a decline in serious crimes like murder and rape last year. The state reported 3,717 cases in 2021, and as a result, UP was ranked 24th in murder cases among 28 other states.
