Red suitcase, dead woman: Police trace a 2,000km murder trail

A red trolley suitcase abandoned on a train has led investigators on a 2,000-kilometre trail from Agra to Chennai and eventually Manipur, where police arrested a young couple in connection with the murder of a 38-year-old woman.

The victim, identified as Odisha native Hayathun Nisha, was living in Guduvanchery, south of Chennai, and working at a private firm. Police suspect she was killed after her relationship with Manik Uddin Laskar, 22, deteriorated over her insistence that he marry her.

Laskar and his wife, Bhagabati Majhi, were arrested in Kashimpur in Manipur’s Jiribam district on Saturday.

Body found inside train suitcase

The investigation began on August 5 after passengers on the Tamil Nadu Express noticed a foul smell coming from a red suitcase in an unreserved compartment after the train reached Agra.

Government Railway Police opened the suitcase and found the decomposing, dismembered and headless remains of a woman.

With no immediate clues to the victim’s identity or who had placed the suitcase on the train, investigators began tracing its journey.

Hundreds of CCTV recordings examined

Working with the Tamil Nadu Police, the Agra Railway Police, the Chennai Government Railway Police, and the Railway Protection Force, investigators examined more than 350 CCTV recordings from Chennai Central and other locations.

Footage showed a man and a woman carrying what appeared to be the same red suitcase into Chennai Central and leaving it aboard the Tamil Nadu Express before getting off.

Investigators then traced their movements to Park station, where they boarded a suburban EMU train and travelled to Guduvanchery. They later left the area in an autorickshaw.

More than 200 cameras around Guduvanchery were examined as police retraced the pair’s movements.

Human remains found at rented house

The trail eventually led investigators to a rented house near Mosque Street, also referred to in reports as Masuthi Street.

The house was locked when police arrived and was subsequently searched. Officers found additional human remains, believed to be Nisha’s, inside a large cooking vessel.

Investigators learnt that three people — a man and two women — had been staying at the property.

Police identified Laskar, originally from Assam’s Cachar district, and his wife Majhi, from Odisha, as the principal suspects. The couple had fled the area.

Their arrest in Manipur brought a breakthrough in a case that began with an unidentified body inside a suitcase and stretched across more than 2,000 kilometres.

With inputs from Agencies