Hyderabad: The Malkajgiri police on Friday arrested a temple priest for murdering a 57-year-old woman, who had been reported missing.
Police said he was hiding the woman’s body in a plastic box inside the temple after beating her to death with an iron rod. He was unable to dispose of the body as a ‘Missing’ poster released by cops with her face went viral on social media platforms.
Anumula Murali Krishna, 42, priest at Sri Swayambhu Siddi Vinayaka Temple at Vishnupuri colony in Malkajgiri, allegedly murdered Gorthy Uma Devi, 57. The motivation is suspected to be to possess the 10-tola gold she was wearing.
He sold it at the jewellery shop of Joshi Nanda Kishore, 45. He was also arrested, police said.
“We recovered from the priest two gold bangles, 1 lakh cash and cards given by the jewellery shop owner. We also seized six gold bangles cut into pieces and two gold chains from Nanda Kishore,” the police said.
The iron rod, a plastic drum and blood stains were recovered from the temple, police added.
Police said that on April 18, they received a missing complaint from Gorthi Venkata Narayana Murthy, 60, stating that his wife Uma Devi went missing. He said she used to visit the Siddi Vinayaka temple every evening.
“She left her home at 6:30pm on April 18 and did not return home. The priest told the cops that she left the temple as usual. However, her footwear was found inside the temple. A missing complaint was registered and it was later altered to murder on Thursday,” said the police.
Based on credible information, the Malkajgiri police nabbed the temple priest and recorded his confession. “He confessed that his plan was to sell the gold and settle his financial problems. On April 18, he used an iron rod to beat her to death, dumped the body in a plastic drum, closed it with a cap, cleaned the floor and kept it in the temple. He sold her gold ornaments at Maa Bhavani Jewellers. After two days, a bad odour started emitting. Following this, on Thursday morning, he took the drum containing the body to the back of the temple by rolling it and dumped the body in the thorny bushes between the railway track at the back of temple,” explained the police.
