Debt-ridden Odisha techie kills friend’s wife in Bengaluru

Odisha Sun Times Bureau
Bengaluru/Bhubaneswar, Mar 3:

A 35-year-old woman from Odisha was allegedly hacked to death by her husband’s friend on Monday afternoon at her Bengaluru residence when she refused to give in to the demands of the man, who was neck-deep in debt.

The deceased, Prachi Das, was brutally murdered by her husband’s close friend Basudev Jena (35) at her residence in Domlur Layout in east Bengaluru.

At around 3 pm, Basudev Jena, a native of Jagatsinghpur, walked into Prachi’s flat and asked for Rs 25,000. When she expressed her inability to pay the amount, an angry Basudev allegedly hit the victim on her head. The accused put his hand on the victim’s neck and tried to snatch her mangalsutra. Prachi screamed for help and rushed into the kitchen.

“The suspect, Basudev Jena went to his friend Debashish’ house to borrow Rs. 25,000 from his wife Prachi, who was alone at home at the time. When she said she did not have so much money to lend, he tried to snatch her gold chain. He panicked when she screamed and slit her throat with a kitchen knife to silence her and rush out to escape,” Deputy Superintendent of Police (East) N Sathish Kumar said.

Upon hearing the screams and noise of utensils, the landlady, Saraswathi, who was living on the ground floor in the same building, rushed to her help. While she was climbing the stairs, she saw Basudev in a blood-stained shirt and with a knife in his hand rushing out of Prachi’s house in a hurry.

The shell-shocked lady raised an alarm following which the society people apprehended him and handed him over to the police. The police have booked Jena under IPC Section 302 (murder).

Prachi was found in a pool of blood in her kitchen with her throat slit.

The accused was working with IT firm Mindtree Consulting and was a close friend of victim’s husband, Debashish Das (35), a software engineer who has been working for Wipro since last June. Incidentally, Debasish got married to Prachi the same month he got a job in Wipro.

The accused and the victim were living in the same building in Domlur. He was Debashish’s roommate before they got married.

Jena came to Bengaluru 11 years ago and helped five people from Odisha, including the victim’s husband, get jobs in the IT city. Later, he relocated to New York where he incurred losses up to Rs 1 crore after several failed endeavours, which forced him to return to Bengaluru in September last year.

On his return, he fetched a job at Mindtree on a monthly salary of Rs 1 lakh. He lives with his wife in Rajarajeshwari Nagar in Bengaluru while his son studies in New York, the police said.

Meanwhile, police are interrogating him. They believe he killed Prachi in a fit of rage over a money dispute.

During interrogation, he claimed the owner had threatened to evict him if he did not pay his dues. He needed Rs 25,000 urgently to clear his outstanding rent dues

Basudev had borrowed money from Debashish earlier also. “He claims he did not go to their house to kill Prachi and it just happened,” police said.