Delhi bed box murder: Woman who killed minor son of live-in partner arrested

A 24-year-old woman has been arrested for allegedly killing the son of her live-in partner and stuffing his body in a bed box, police said on Tuesday. Pooja Kumari, a resident of Ranhola, killed 11-year-old Divyansh holding the minor responsible for his father not divorcing his wife, police said. On Thursday, around 8.30 pm, police received information from BLK Hospital that a boy had been brought dead and there were strangulation marks on his neck.

During investigation, footage from a CCTV camera was examined. It showed that the last person who visited the 11-year-old boy’s house was the woman, Pooja Kumari, a senior police officer said.

She had strangled the child to death when he was sleeping and then concealed his body inside the bed box, police said and added that the woman was in a live-in relation with the boy’s father Jitender. Police checked footage of more than 300 CCTV cameras, leading to her arrest, Special Commissioner of Police (Crime) Ravindra Singh Yadav said.

The footage showed the woman in areas on the Najafgarh Nangloi Road — Ranhola, Nihal Vihar and Rishal Garden. Her location was zeroed in at Bakkarwala, the officials said. Reportedly, Pooja Kumari and Jitender had married at a temple of the arya Samaj on October 17, 2019. But a court marriage was not possible as Jitender had not divorced his wife, police said.

Jitender had assured Pooja Kumari that they would get married in court after he gets a divorce from his wife, according to police. Jitender and Pooja Kumari, however, started living together by renting a house.

They often quarrelled over Jitender’s divorce and after sometime, he moved out of the rented house and started staying with his wife, police said.

He had moved out in December last year, and Pooja Kumari was furious about it. She assumed that Jitender left her because of his son, Yadav said.

On Thursday, she met her friend and asked him to take her to Jitender’s house, police said. The door of the house was open and she killed Divyansh, who was sleeping, they said and added that she took out clothes from the bed box and put the body inside it.