NEW DELHI: An 18-year-old youth was arrested for strangling a 72-year-old woman to death in her house in Multan Nagar, Delhi, and stealing Rs 20,000 from the house.
Police said the arrest was made within four hours of the crime being reported. The cops identified the teenager as Rohit Dubey, a resident of Sagar, Madhya Pradesh, who was working at the shop belonging to the woman’s son.
On Wednesday around 1am, police received information from Balaji Action Hospital in Paschim Vihar about an elderly woman, Saroj Jain, being admitted to by her son and her death due to strangulation. A police team reached the hospital and met the son, Manish Jain, who told the cops that he and his mother lived in Multan Nagar.
Parvinder Singh, DCP (Outer), said, “Manish said he runs the Jain Kachori shop where Rohit Dubey worked as a helper. On February 4, according to Manish, Dubey stole Rs 90,000 from his house and hid the money in a storage compartment in the shop. Manish said he did not file a police complaint regarding the theft since he found the money in his shop on February 7. He also did not say anything to Dubey, who had been given a room near the shop. However, the following day, Manish got a train ticket for Dubey to reach his hometown and dropped him at Hazrat Nizamuddin railway station.”
Manish added that he was unaware Dubey had returned to Delhi and reached Multan Nagar on Wednesday night when his mother was alone at home. "He broke into the house and stole Rs 20,000. When Saroj spotted Dubey and tried to raise an alarm, he pushed her on the floor and strangled her underfoot,” revealed DCP Singh. “Manish reached home and spotted Dubey escaping. While Manish attended to his mother, Dubey reached the shop in search of the Rs 90,000 he had hidden earlier. The youngster was nabbed by Manish's employees.”
Police said that the elderly woman was taken to the hospital where the doctors opined that the cause of death was asphyxia as a result of manual strangulation.
“Dubey confessed that when Saroj Jain resisted, he pressed his foot on her neck, and broke the neck bone, killing her on the spot,” added the DCP. “He was arrested and booked for murder. The Rs 20,000 that he stole was also recovered from him. Dubey, who had passed Class XII, had been sent to work at Manish's shop by one of the latter’s relatives.”
