New Delhi: On 3 October, Lucknow resident Ramesh Yadav got a distress call from his middle child, Nikhil, about a purported attack on his mother, Renu, and him. Yadav, a milkman, rushed home, only to find ransacked furniture and the news that his wife was sent to a nearby hospital.
Soon after, Yadav was informed that his wife, Renu Yadav, had been declared dead.
The inside of the house—the scene of the crime—gave the appearance that it was a classic case of murder in the middle of a theft, but something was amiss.
The family first developed doubts when they saw the footage of the CCTV camera installed just two houses away. The footage was from after the murder.
“Nikhil was coming out of the house—well-groomed—before leaving the house on his bike,” Ramesh Yadav’s eldest son, Preet Yadav, told ThePrint on what he saw in the CCTV footage. “I found the comfort with which he moved away from the house disturbing; it raised my suspicion.”
In an investigation, Uttar Pradesh Police uncovered the entire plot, followed by the 6 October arrest of Nikhil Yadav, who has been accused by the police of killing his mother, Renu Yadav, after getting suspicious of having been seen stealing jewellery from the house.
In his confession before the police, Nikhil allegedly revealed that he first attacked his mother on her neck with a screwdriver, followed by hitting her with an LPG cylinder.
In an address to the press, Nipun Agarwal, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) in Lucknow South, said that Nikhil had been addicted to betting platforms, including Tirangagames.com and disclosed transactions totalling Rs 50 lakh on these platforms over the last year. DCP Agarwal added that Nikhil also confessed to lending money from betting applications and facing threats and blackmail from cyber criminals.
This murder case comes when the Centre is nearly ready to notify a law banning betting apps amid a widespread crackdown by law enforcement agencies on platforms promoting betting and money games across the country.
“We have reached a conclusion based on investigation and evidence that Nikhil himself killed his mother and created all the drama around the call to his father to mislead the police and his family members,” DCP Agarwal said Tuesday.
“He was stealing his mother’s jewellery from home, and first attacked her with a screwdriver on suspicion that she saw him stealing the valuable items. Later, he attacked her with a cylinder in the house, leading to her death,” DCP Agarwal further said.
‘Killed on suspicion, no remorse’
His younger brother Nikhil, along with their mother Renu, had returned from their grandmother’s place hours before the incident, Preet recalled, speaking to ThePrint.
He added that upon their return, their youngest sibling, Nitin Yadav, confronted Nikhil about his debts. Preet said that Nitin asked Nikhil about the nature and magnitude of his debts, for which their father had received an abusive call earlier in the day.
“Nikhil shrugged it off and made light of the questions, after which Nitin left home to play cricket,” said Preet, a professional cricketer in Lucknow.
The family, according to Preet, had no inkling of the intensity of Nikhil’s addiction to online betting games and insurmountable debts that eventually came to consume the entire family, with the murder of their mother.
“Had we known anything remotely close to what we are hearing from the police or his friends, the situation would, much earlier, be contained,” he further recalled, speaking over a phone call with ThePrint. “Playing online games is not a criminal offence anyway, and almost everyone plays games nowadays. Hence, it never struck us that something of this level could happen to us.”
Nikhil was pursuing a Bachelor of Arts at the Lucknow-based KKV Degree College.
DCP Agarwal stated that Nikhil was a habitual user of the betting platforms and mortgaged his mother’s jewellery to repay his debts on the platforms. On earlier occasions, however, Nikhil would also somehow retrieve the jewellery, DCP Agarwal said.
During police questioning, Nikhil revealed that his mother was coming frequently to the room from where he had been and was trying to steal jewellery on the day of the murder. Before that, she had slept in the same room, ensuring that he could not steal during night hours.
“Having grown suspicious of her awareness about the attempt to steal jewellery, he attacked and killed her,” DCP Agarwal further said.
A day after the incident, the CCTVs installed in the locality underwent a thorough scanning for signs of possible intruders entering the house, Preet further said. That is when Nikhil was seen exiting the house, well-prepared and on his father’s bike, he added.
“No one whose mother would die and in such a gruesome manner would be as comfortable as Nikhil appeared in the footage. There were no signs of his raised voice or panicked reaction outside the house, suggesting that he was genuinely bothered. Instead, he appeared to be in no remorse, and it was a shocking revelation for the family,” Preet said.
Then, Nikhil proceeded to Charbagh railway station in Lucknow, boarded a train, and left the city, said the police, who later arrested him in Fatehpur district.
“Jewellery, such as a gold chain and earrings, were recovered from him, along with a screwdriver used in the murder,” DCP Agarwal said.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)