Police investigating the murder of Telugu businessman Jayaram Chigurupati, who was found dead in his car under suspicious circumstances in Nandigama in AP two days back, have taken his niece and her friend into custody for questioning.
The Nandigama police used Jayaram’s mobile call data to retrace his movements prior to his death and found that he was confined to a house in Jubilee Hills in Hyderabad for almost 30 hours between January 30 and 31, reported The Times of India. The police are yet to ascertain what happened during those 30 hours.
Police said Jayaram had earlier attended a meeting of Zenotech Laboratories at a hotel in Hyderabad. The meeting was attended by his niece Pulivarthi Madhuri alias Shikha Choudhary (28) and her friend Rakesh Reddy (30).
Shikha Choudhary, her sister and brother, and her driver are also being questioned by a team of officials.
At a press conference held on Saturday, Krishna district SP Sarvasreshta Tripathi and Nandigama DSP Subhash Chandra Bose, officials in charge of the case, clarified that the investigation is still ongoing and that no one has been accused yet. The police are awaiting the forensic report to establish the cause of death.
The police are yet to confirm the motive behind the crime, but pointed out that Jayaram had recently transferred Rs 4.5 crore to Rakesh telling him to sever all ties with his niece.
Jayaram (55) was the owner of Zenotech Laboratories and a few other businesses in Andhra Pradesh. He was also the Managing Director of Express TV, a now-defunct Telugu channel. An NRI, Jayaram was also the Director of Coastal Bank and owned a pharmaceutical company called Hemarus.
The businessman was found dead in the back seat of his car in a farmland near Aitavaram village off the Hyderabad-Vijayawada highway in Krishna district on Friday. There were blood stains on his body. The body was preserved after autopsy as Jayaram’s family members were yet to arrive from the US.
Eight police teams from Krishna district launched the investigation in Hyderabad on Saturday, questioning several people including Jayaram’s relatives and employees of Coastal Bank.
The deceased had left his Jubilee Hills home in Hyderabad for Vijayawada on Thursday. According to the police, CCTV footage at different toll gates on the highway was examined from which it was revealed that Jayaram was sitting in the back seat. The police are trying to identify the man who was driving the vehicle.
Police suspect that the conspiracy to kill Jayaram was hatched in Hyderabad.
“The culprits did commit the murder in a meticulous fashion without leaving clues. Around eight teams are investigating the killing and we are taking the help of Hyderabad police as well,” Tripathi told media.
In an earlier version, TNM had put up an erroneous image of one of the suspects. The error is deeply regretted and we apologise for the same.