Army jawan, 2 others arrested for Nainital woman’s murder in revenge attack: Police

Three men, including an Army jawan, have been arrested for allegedly murdering a 56-year-old woman in Uttarakhand’s Nainital district as part of a revenge plot linked to the killing of the soldier’s father in 2023, police said on Thursday.

The woman, Vimla Devi, was allegedly assaulted and drowned before her body was dumped outside a residence in Kishanpur Choi village, police said. CCTV footage purportedly captured the accused assaulting and abducting her before dumping her body from a vehicle near the crime scene.

Police identified the arrested men as Mohit Fartyal (32), an Army jawan posted with the Rajputana Rifles regiment of the Indian Army, and Sairan (21) and Mohammad Abbuzar (22), both residents of Ramnagar.

Preliminary investigations suggest that Fartyal orchestrated the attack to avenge his father Govind Singh Bisht’s murder in 2023, in which the deceased woman’s sons were named as accused in the FIR, Ramnagar Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Manjunath TC said.

The three men were also allegedly on their way to Almora to eliminate the victim’s sons when police intercepted them near Ramlila Ground in Ramnagar, officers said.

Investigators have also seized a car suspected to have been used in the crime, along with wooden sticks and other blunt objects allegedly used in the assault.

The SSP said the incident came to light on Tuesday when the police received a distress call via the Dial 112 emergency service regarding a woman’s body lying outside the residence of Trilok Singh Bisht in Kishanpur Choi.

“A police team rushed to the spot and identified the deceased as Vimla Devi, wife of Khilaf Singh Bisht. As the body bore severe injury marks, a forensic team was called in to collect scientific evidence from the scene,” the SSP said.

Based on a formal complaint lodged by the deceased’s son, Kundan Singh Bisht, a first information report (FIR) was registered against unidentified assailants under Sections 332(c) (house-trespass), 103(1) (murder), and 352 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).

A special team led by Superintendent of Police (SP) Harbans Singh was formed. During the probe, investigators scanned closed-circuit television (CCTV) footage from the locality, which allegedly captured three men assaulting the woman, forcibly abducting her, and subsequently dumping her body from a vehicle near the crime scene.

“Technical surveillance and sustained field investigations helped us zero in on the suspects,” the SSP added.

All three accused were produced before a local court on Thursday and remanded to judicial custody, police said, adding that further investigation into the matter is underway.