High-Profile Murder: Neeraj Grover's murder and the arrest of actress Maria Susairaj, her boyfriend JEROME MATHEW

NEERAJ GROVER: He was killed, body cut in pieces, then burnt.

It is surely one of the most talked about high-profile murders in India.

The brutal killing of Neeraj Grover, a TV production house executive, had captured the imagination of the entire country.

Though Grover was killed on May 7, 2008, it had taken a few days before it became clear that he had been murdered.

The body was cut into pieces. It had taken hours for the killer to chop the body parts and then it was stuffed and taken to jungle, where the body parts were set afire.

The incident had hit national headlines as it was nothing short of a crime thriller and it also had the touch of glamour world in it. At the heart of the story was an actor--Maria Susairaj. She was a Kannada movie actress who wanted to try her luck in Bollywood.

Grover who worked as creative director for TV production house, Synergy Adlabs, in Mumbai, went missing in mysterious circumstances. His father Amarnath Grover had lodged a complaint about his son's sudden disappearance.

CRIME RECALL
The middle-aged man had no inkling then that his son had been killed days ago and the killers had tried every bit to conceal the evidences. Maria who hailed from Mysore (Karnataka) had a steady relationship with Jerome Mathew.

Maria Susairaj: Accomplice or just a victim of circumstances!

Mathew, who came from a Catholic Christian family, was a bright student. He joined Navy and was serving at the Kochi base.

After his engagement, Mathew was getting more possessive about Maria, who was struggling to get a role in TV serials in Mumbai.

It was a phone call that led to the turn of events which devastated three families.

When Jerome called up his fiancee (Maria), who was at her home, she picked up the phone. Jerome heard Neeraj's voice in the background. He got suspicious.

Though Maria tried to clear up things, the possessive boyfriend wasn't satisfied.

 He put down the phone and immediately took the flight from Kochi to Mumbai. Oblivious to his impending arrival, Maria and Neeraj were having fun at the flat.

Neeraj was helping Maria settle in the world of show biz. She also needed important contacts in the film industry. Neeraj Grover was getting close to her. They were spending the night together when the call came and the possessive Jerome flew down to Mumbai in the next couple of hours.

When Jerome knocked the door, they didn't expect it. They had been physically intimate that night. When Jerome saw Neeraj, allegedly without a shred of clothes on his body, inside the house, he had an argument. Infuriated, Jerome used the kitchen knife to stab Neeraj in cold blood.

After the murder, he allegedly kept cutting the body into pieces. Later, he allegedly had sexual intercourse with Maria. The question was how to dispose off the body. Maria got a car from a friend and the 'body' was stuffed in a sports bag, taken to a desolate place at Manor where it was burnt.

Lieutenant Jerome Mathew got 10 yrs jail for the murder

But the search for Grover soon landed them in police net. Cell phone records proved that Neeraj had spent the night at her flat.

As evidences kept piling up, the story behind the spine chilling murder came out in the open. Both were arrested. The trial began in the case.

The Mumbai court.held Grover guilty and gave him ten years of rigorous imprisonment. In light of the serious nature of crime, the prison term may appear light but the reason was judge felt that seeing the fiancee in company of another person, was surely a provocation.

Maria Susairaj got away rather lightly. She was charged with destruction of evidence. She had three years to serve in jail. During the course of trial, she was incarcerated and hence, she didn't have to stay behind bards for long, and came out. Her lawyer had argued that she was just a victim of the circumstances.

The deceased, Neeraj Grover's father, Amarnath Grover, continues to fight, hoping that the higher court would give a stern punishment to Maria and Jerome. The Grover family that lives in Kanpur has been fighting the battle to get justice for their son.

SOMNATH PARIDA: 'Monster Doctor' chopped wife into 300 pieces after murdering her

No one would have believed that the sophisticated retired doctor could kill his own wife with such brutality.

That he not just murdered her but chopped her into 300 pieces, sent a chill down the spine of even the investigators.

Somnath Parida's story is shocking by any standards. The 72-year-old man with a rank of lieutenant colonerl had retired from army.

He lived with his wife Ushashree, 62, in a house in a posh colony in Bhubaneswar in Orissa (now Odisha).

The couple's children are settled abroad. The elderly husband and wife lived here alone.

Nobody had an inkling that the medico could have committed such a horrific crime.

But when his wife went 'missing', there was suspicion among residents and his relatives.

The suspicion increased when didn't let others enter his house. When a relative went to his home, Parida didn't let him step inside.

There was a foul smell coming out of the house. The stench was so strong that it made others believe that something was seriously wrong.

The police were informed. What came out was a horrible scenario. Parida's wife had been brutally murdered by him. Ushashree was killed and then chopped into hundreds of pieces. These body parts filled the 22 containers that were kept in steel trunks. 

The doctor had then put body parts in chemicals to apparently dispose them and suppress the stench. Sharp-edged weapons, knives and surgical instruments that were used in the cruel act, were also recovered from his house.

Parida was arrested. He said that he had killed his wife on June 3. But the old man didn't reveal much. He tried to mislead police. Initially he said that his wife had committed suicide by banging her head against the wall of the house.

IN HAPPIER TIMES: PARIDA AND USHASHREE

The elderly doctor's son had been calling his mother on phone but she was not responding for sometime.

The son contacted other relatives and asked for a check on the house. It was then that the stench and the suspicion together led the relative to police.

Ushashree's brother Ranjan Samal had reached the house when he was driven out by her brother-in-law. He then informed police.

During interrogation, Parida confessed his crime though he had earlier tried to give it a different spin.


Local residents said Parida dressed well. He had a reputation of being short-tempered but people didn't hear him have any argument with his wife.

Then, what made him commit the despicable crime of cutting her body into hundreds of parts.


The body parts are being sent to lab for forensic examination. The police are interrogating the doctor to find out the motive behind the ghastly murder. Though he has been quizzed, the mystery remains as he is yet to reveal the provocation that made him a monster.