New Delhi: Army Major Nikhil Handa, who was arrested on Sunday in connection with the murder of the wife of a fellow officer, was obsessed with the woman and wanted to marry her. He murdered her when he found out she was not okay with the plan, the Delhi Police said. Shailza Dwivedi, wife of Major Amit Dwivedi, was found run over by a car, her throat slit, in the Delhi Cantonment area on Saturday.
Major Handa and Dwivedi had met in 2015 in Nagaland when her husband was posted there. They had kept in touch, even when she came to Delhi after her husband was transferred.
They talked continuously on phone, though he was the one who called her more often, the police said. Major Dwivedi once caught them during a video call. “He confronted his wife and Nikhil and warned him to not come close to his wife and his house,” said an officer of the Delhi Police during a press conference this evening.
Major Handa, who is currently posted in Nagaland’s Dimapur, was arrested on Sunday from Meerut, Uttar Pradesh, after Major Dwivedi revealed his suspicion to the police and subsequent investigations were made.
Shailza Dwivedi was murdered when she had gone for a physiotherapy session. CCTV footage from outside the Army Base Hospital in the cantonment area showed her getting into a car. Her body was found in the area half-an hour later. She was run over, but the police found that her throat had been slit earlier.
In the CCTV footage, a Honda City car was seen, “in which there was only one person” the police said.
Major Handa, the police said, reached Delhi on Saturday and asked Dwivedi to meet him. During the drive, they had an argument. He was obsessive and pressured her to marry him and when she refused, “he stabbed her with a knife… he pushed her from the car and ran over her body to make it look like an accident,” an officer said.
The car, the police said, contained evidence – bloodstains, more than one knife. There was a Swiss knife, which has prints all over it, the police said. He tried to clean the car with towels, but there was blood still, an officer said. “It looks like he slit her (throat) suddenly,” an officer said.
“We raided many places overnight for Nikhil Handa. We tracked his movement. We found out he went towards Meerut. He resisted a bit when asked to join the investigation,” the police said.
The police said lately, Major Handa had been out of touch with everyone, including his family. He had even got himself admitted in a hospital “because of migraines”. Further investigation in the case is on, the police said.
