Guna (Madhya Pradesh): After the court of second additional sessions judge Varsha Sharma sentenced one minor (now major) accused of triple murder to life imprisonment, the court here in Guna sentenced his mother Purnima Aggarwal alias Poonam Dubey alias Pakka for her involvement in the triple murder case.
The court found Poonam guilty under section 302 (murder) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for murdering Hemant Meena, Lokesh Lodha and Ritik Namdev and burning the bodies by pouring petrol in a bid to hide evidence.
According to information, Poonam and her son hatched a conspiracy to extort money from Hemant’s father after murdering him in May, 2017. After murdering Hemant, Poonam and her son murdered Lokesh after he demanded his share of the extortion money immediately, while they murdered Ritik since he knew everything.
The entire matter came to the fore on May 27, 2017, when the complainant Mintu was walking on side of the railway track and saw many people surrounding one charred body at the Patel Nagar railway bridge. He immediately called the police. The cops sent the body for post-mortem and later identified the deceased as Ritik. Initially, the police thought, Lokesh Lodha could be the accused, but after some time the police recovered his body and as a result, the entire theory changed.
After recovering the body of Ritik and Lokesh, the police zeroed in on their investigation of Poonam since Hemant’s father doubted her involvement in his son’s missing case. Later, during interrogation, Poonam and her minor son revealed that they murdered Hemant as well. They also confessed to killing Lokesh and Ritik.
According to Guna police, Poonam had first implicated her son's friend Hemant. She also started ordering jewellery and money from his house. She had also mortgaged Hemant's mother's earrings for Rs 25k. The police later seized them.
According to the police, accused Poonam had a good friendship with Hemant and this exasperated his minor son and also became a reason for Hemant's death.
Poonam told the police that after the murder of Hemant, its secret should not be revealed, and that is why two more of his friends – Lokesh and Ritik were killed.
High-profile people became active when Poonam was picked up. Initially, the police took it as a normal case. When the then TI Ashish Sapre called Poonam and her minor son to the police station for questioning, many people's phones began ringing in defence of Poonam, known for her relationship with high-profile people. Meanwhile, the police got information that two friends of her minor son, Lokesh Lodha and Hrithik Namdev were also missing.
