10-year-old murdered in Chennai

CHENNAI: A ten-year-old boy was kidnapped on Wednesday and brutally murdered inside an apartment near Tambaram by a man who had a dispute with the boy's family. The murder came to light on Thursday after police who were searching for the boy based on a missing complaint by the family held the suspect, E Nagaraj (27) who was known to the boy's parents.

The deceased boy was identified as K Ritesh Sai, a class 4 student at a private school in Nesapakkam. The arrested person, Nagaraj, a native of Tiruvannamalai district worked as a marketing manager with a private builder. Nagaraj, police said was acquainted with the boy's mother, Manjula who worked in the Electricity board.

 Manjula's husband, Karthikeyan runs an interior decorating firm. On Wednesday evening, Nagaraj had picked up the boy from his tuition. 

When Karthikeyan turned up at the tuition centre to enquire about the boy, he was informed that he left with the person who occasionally picks the boy.

Karthikeyan filed a complaint with the MGR Nagar police who began searching for the boy. Preliminary investigations revealed that Nagaraj has a beef with Karthikeyan and police had arbitrated an issue between them few months ago. Police sources said that Karthikeyan suspected Nagaraj to be in a relationship with his wife and had also alleged that Nagaraj was trying to usurp his property through a relationship with his wife.

Meanwhile, on Friday, a police team picked up Nagaraj when he was fleeing to Tiruvannamalai and after investigations learnt about the murder. He took the investigators to the newly constructed apartment complex on IAF road near Selayur, where the dead body of the boy was found in an apartment.

Since Nagaraj was the marketing manager in-charge of selling the unsold apartments, he had access to the apartments. He took the boy to one of the apartments where he murdered him.

He had initially slit the boy’s neck with a broken glass and then hit the boy with an iron rod on the back of his head and murdered him. He then left the dead body in a pool of blood and fled the scene around 8 pm. Police secured the child’s body and moved it to the Government hospital.

MGR Nagar police booked Nagaraj on charges of murder. He was produced before a magistrate and remanded in judicial custody. Further investigations are on.