Open and shut case: Cops

The police are awaiting the fingerprint and ballistic reports to link the finer details of the murders in Lokhandwala last week.

Avinash Patnaik, 22, allegedly shot dead his former girlfriend Moon Das’ mother and uncle before pulling the trigger on himself at the Das’ flat on Thursday night.

“It is an open and shut case with very little to investigate any further. However, we are waiting for the fingerprint and ballistic reports, which will clearly show if the bullets that killed Kanan Das and Vikas Sarkar were fired from Patnaik’s country-made

revolver,” said Archana Tyagi, additional commissioner of police (west region).

Patnaik’s father Bhupen has, however, alleged that his did not commit suicide, but was killed “under mysterious circumstances”.

Terming his son’s death ‘strange’, he said Patnaik had been ‘trapped and murdered’. Bhupen, a superintending engineer, said he had reasons to suspect the police version that his son had killed two people before shooting himself dead.

“The bullet that killed him was shot through his left temple; but my son was a right-hander,” he said. Moreover, there was no reason for him to commit suicide because he was doing well in his business. “A fashionable and jolly person cannot commit such a crime,” he said.

Tyagi, refuting Bhupen’s claim, said, “Patnaik was standing near the window. There is a probability that he might have seen the police entering the building. And as the main door was locked, he had no chance of escaping. His body was found near the

window when the police entered the room,” she said. A police team will visit Patnaik’s hometown to investigate how he procured the weapon.

Meanwhile, the mobile phone belonging to Patnaik, which was recovered from the scene of the crime, has been sent to experts for examination. “We will find out if Patnaik had talked with Das before or during the incident,” said another police officer from Oshiwara police station.