Soumya Pushpakaran, the civil police officer who met with a tragic end after she was set on fire by a male cop Ajaz, used to share everything in her life with her mother Indira. Indira was the only person in the family who was aware of the friendship between Ajaz and Soumya.
Soumya was stabbed and set on fire in broad daylight on Saturday. The 34-year old is the mother of three children. Soumya Pushpakaran was a civil police officer at the Vallikunnam police station in Alappuzha. 33-year old Ajaz is a civil police officer working with traffic unit at Aluva in Ernakulam.
“Ajaz and Soumya were friends for three years. The friendship turned bitter when Soumya realized that it would affect her family life. Ajaz wanted her to marry him, and to leave her husband and children, which Soumya rejected. She then stopped answering his calls and she blocked him on Whatsapp as well. This made Ajaz agitated,” Sub Inspector Shaiju Ibrahim of Vallikunnam police station who is the investigating officer in the case told TNM.
Since Indira was the only person in the family who has met Ajaz, the investigating team on Sunday recorded the statement of Indira, some other relatives and neighbours of Soumya in Vallikunnam.
Soumya had met Ajaz during the training for newly selected civil police officers at the police academy Thrissur. Later they became friends through Facebook.
According to the police, there were also financial dealings between Ajaz and Soumya which Indira was aware of. “Indira and Soumya were like close friends and Soumya used to share everything happening in her life with her mother though they were living in two separate houses,” the SI added.
A crime that was pre-planned
The investigating officer alleges that the crime was pre-planned. “His intention was to kill himself as well. He first poured petrol on himself, he then stabbed her, poured petrol on Soumya and set her on fire. He sustained forty per cent burns,” said Shaiju Irbahim.
And while the investigating officer said that Ajaz was known to be duty-bound police officer in the force, he was fully aware of the repercussions of the crime. He said, “The weapons, the knife he used was sharp. He must have bought it from some market. As a cop it was not like he didn’t know the repercussions, but he intended to kill himself also.”
The autopsy was conducted on Soumya’s body at Medical College, Vandanam in Alappuzha.
Speaking to the media, Indira said, “He did this to my daughter earlier too. Once he had poured petrol on her and beaten her with shoes on her back. I then told her that I would speak to him, but she objected fearing that if I intervened things would get worse. Later she was somehow hoping that he would become a bit calm.”
Pushpakaran,Soumya's father and their family belong to Klappana in Kollam. Pushpakaran, according to reports, has been confined to his bed for years and it was Indira, a tailor, who raised Soumya and her sister with the money she earned. Soumya and children shifted to their new home in Vallikunnu recently. Soumya has three children, a 10-year-old boy, a seven-year-old son and a daughter aged four. Soumya’s husband works abroad.
“The elder children are in a traumatic state and their teachers are trying to console them and take care of them as per our request. The younger one doesn’t know what is happening,” the SI said.