Murder of Shraddha Walkar

Shraddha Walkar
Born	1995 Maharashtra, India
Died	May 18, 2022 (aged 27) Delhi, India
Cause of death	Strangulation in domestic violence
Occupation	Call centre employee

Shraddha Walkar was a 27-year-old Indian woman who was murdered by her 28-year-old boyfriend and live-in partner Aaftab Amin Poonawala in Delhi on 18 May 2022. Walkar's father accused Poonawala of waging what he called love jihad.

Incident

The case only came to light nearly six months after the murder, when Shraddha's father lodged a missing persons complaint after learning from Shraddha's friends that they were unable to contact her for over two-and-a-half months. On 18 May 2022, 28-year-old Aaftab Poonawala strangled his live-in partner Shraddha over an argument and then proceeded to dismember her body into 35 pieces, allegedly charring her face to hide her identity. A 300-litre fridge was used to store her body parts, which were individually disposed in the Chhatarpur forest over the next 18 days, at around 2 AM every night to avoid suspicion.

Poonawala was arrested by the Delhi Police on 12 November 2022. Shraddha's father has demanded the death penalty for Aaftab.

Shraddha Walkar

Shraddha Walkar lived with her family until 2018, which consisted of her mother and brother in Vasai, Palghar District, Maharashtra. She studied in a convent school in Vasai and took admission in a BMM course in Viva Institute of Technology, Virar. She later dropped out from the course. Her father, Vikas Walkar, lived separately and operated an electronics service business. While working at a call centre of an MNC in Malad, Shraddha met Aaftab Amin Poonawala via the Bumble app. Aaftab is also resident of Vasai. He went to L.S. Raheja College for BMM studies. He, coincidentally, also worked at the same call centre. In 2019, she moved out to live with him, against her family's wishes, who opposed the interfaith relationship and the idea of living-in with someone "she barely knew".

Friends and family of Shraddha have further accused Poonawala of physically abusing Walkar regularly prior to the murder. They were said to frequently argue over financial issues, and they were arguing when the murder took place. During interrogation, Aftab confessed to the crime and said that they fought often as Shraddha was pressurizing him for marriage.

Shraddha's father, Vikas Walkar, had no idea that she was living in Delhi, and thought that she was in Bangalore. Whenever he asked her about her partner, she would not speak much about him. Her father also stated that she was closer to her uncle than to him.

Accused

Aaftab Poonawala worked at the same MNC call centre as Shraddha Walkar, whom he met on Bumble. He confessed to the murder after the police discovered discrepancies in his statements and recovered evidence of the murder. He was then taken to the forest to identify Shraddha's remains. The police brought a dog squad to discover the body parts. However, many pieces, including the head, could not be found. Thirteen decomposed parts of her body were found, of which mostly pieces of bones remained. Upon a DNA match, it was confirmed that the body parts indeed belonged to Shraddha.

Being a trained chef, Aaftab knew how to dismember and preserve flesh. The Delhi Police also revealed that after searching on Google, he cleaned blood stains from the floor with some chemicals and disposed of the stained clothes. Aaftab had taken inspiration from the TV show Dexter to dispose the body. He used to sleep in the same room where he had chopped the victim's body. He used to see the face after keeping it in the fridge and also cleaned the fridge after disposing of the body parts. He started by chopping off her liver and intestines.

In his confession, Aaftab stated that he had planned to kill Shraddha Walkar a week before he actually did it. However, seeing her emotional and crying, he decided to "hold back for later". He believed Shraddha Walkar had trust issues and accused him of cheating whenever he talked to someone on the phone.

On 31 July 2023, Shraddha Walkar's father, Vikas Madan Walkar, was presented before the sessions court in Saket as a prosecution witness, where he testified that Aaftab Poonawala told him that he had purchased a shovel, two knives, and a hammer and cut both of Shraddha's wrists during the night, placing the body parts in a polythene bag.

In the same session, Shraddha's brother Shreejay Walkar also testified against Aaftab, stating that two weeks after leaving her home, Shraddha told him that she and Aaftab were fighting a lot — verbal and physical. She had told him that Aaftab would beat her up occasionally. In spite of trying to reason with her, she refused to breakup with him, saying that Aaftab would apologise to her after every fight, and she would accept the apology and continue living with him. Following this, Shreejay's interaction with Shraddha also reduced substantially, after he believed she has been completely influenced by Aaftab. After the death of their mother, Shreejay advised Shraddha to breakup with Aaftab again, which she did not listen to.

Arrest

Aaftab Amin Poonawalla was charged by Delhi police for killing Shraddha Walkar and chopping her body in May 2022. The chargesheet was based on evidence and witness testimony. Police allege he strangled Shraddha and disposed of remains. Aaftab was arrested after investigation found last location in Delhi. He is currently lodged in Tihar Jail cell number 4 in West Delhi, where he is constantly surveilled. The Delhi Police also filed a 6,629 pages long chargesheet against him. The chargesheet was filed 75 days after the investigation began.

On 29 November 2022, when Aaftab was being taken back to jail from the Forensic Science Laboratory of West Delhi, the police van was attacked by sword-wielding members of Hindu Sena. The organisation distanced itself from the incident, saying what the activists did was out of their personal motive, and that the organisation shall never support any act that is against the Constitution of India.

On 15 March 2024, on the request of his lawyer Akshay Bhandari, the Delhi high ordered Tihar prison to let Aaftab Poonawala out of his prison cell for eight hours every day like the rest of the inmates. Previously, he was only allowed to step out of his prison cell for two hours. The order was passed by a bench headed by Justice Suresh Kumar Kait on a petition filed by Poonawala, saying that under he cannot be kept in solitary confinement under the "garb of security".

Reactions

Kaushal Kishore, the Union Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affair, said that couples who wish to live together must register in court or should have proper registration. He also added that women should stay away from such live-in relationships.

The case was cited by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad as an example of love jihad, who demanded that the central government make laws to stop such incidents from happening, adding that they have recorded 420 incidents of love jihad in the past ten years from New Delhi alone. The group also decided to launch a campaign from 21 to 31 December 2022 to raise awareness about love jihad.

An interfaith wedding reception that had to take place on 20 November 2022 in Vasai, the town Aaftab and Shraddha belonged to, had to be cancelled because of local Hindu and Muslim organisations contacting the owner of the marriage hall and urging him to cancel the event to ensure peace in the area. The incident was a result of the editor-in-chief of Sudharshan News Suresh Chavanke doxing the couple's wedding invitation card on Twitter. While initially the couple had no idea their wedding invitation card had gone viral on social media, they decided to call off the reception following the political discourse it had taken.

Inspired killings

Following the incident, many other killings were inspired from it.

On 15 November 2022, a couple of days after the incident came to light, a similar incident was witnessed in Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh. The accused, Prince Yadav, along with his cousin, strangled his ex-girlfriend Aradhana Prajapati to death. They had been dating for two years, after which he went abroad and she married elsewhere. This enraged him, which was followed by the murder. After her death, he chopped her body into six pieces and packed the pieces in a plastic bag and dumped it in a well outside the village. He also severed her head and threw it in a pond. After being arrested, Prince tried to flee, but was shot by the police.

On 20 November 2022, the Baruipur police produced a 48 year old Shyamali Chakraborty and her 25 year old son Joy Chakraborty before the court for the murder of the 55 year old retired Indian Navy personnel Ujjwal Chakraborty. In a statement given to the police, Joy confessed that he needed money to go to Chennai, but his father not only refused, but also beat him and his mother. Following this, Joy strangulated Ujjwal to death, and then disposed of his body with Shyamali's help. They chopped his body into six pieces with a hacksaw, which they also threw in a pond along with the body.

On 9 February 2023, Nikki Yadav was strangled to death with a charging cable by her husband, Sahil Gehlot in Najafgarh, Delhi. The couple married at a temple in Noida in 2020, and Gehlot had been engaging in an extramarital affair, as his family was not happy with his decision to marry Yadav and fixed his marriage elsewhere. Upon finding out about this a day before his remarriage, Yadav confronted Gehlot about him, following which he murdered her. He took help from his father to hide the body in a refrigerator located in the family's dhaba. The body was discovered on 14 February, and the police arrested his father.

On 14 February 2023, Megha, a 37 year old nurse was murdered by her live-in partner and stuffed in a mattress in Palghar, Maharashtra. They often quarreled, the last one being when he killed her. He messaged his sister about the murder, and sold off his furniture before fleeing. A week after her death, her body began to smell, due to which the neighbours complained about the stench to the police. The man was found and arrested.

On 25 September 2024, a 31 year old Muktiranjan Pratap Ray killed 29 year old Mahalakshmi in Bangalore in a similar manner. Her body was chopped off in 59 pieces and stuffed in a refrigerator for 18 days. Ray spent the entire night after the murder contemplating on how to dispose the body. Later, he committed suicide by hanging himself from a tree.