Shraddha Walkar’s Father Confirms DNA Match, Aaftab Files Bail Plea in Court

Vikas Walkar also met the newly appointed commissioner of the Mira Bhayander Vasai Virar Commissionerate.

Shraddha Walkar's father Vikas and BJP leader Kirit Somaiya.

(Photo: PTI)

A day after Delhi Police said that body parts recovered from the jungles of Mehrauli will be sent for a "post-mortem," Shraddha Walkar's father Vikas confirmed to reporters in Mumbai that the DNA extracted from the bones matched with his samples.

Vikas Walkar said:

“Yes, I have been told that the DNA samples (his own with that of the bones that were recovered) have matched. Let’s see what happens.”

Accompanied by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Kirit Somaiya, Vikas on Friday, 16 December, met the newly appointed commissioner of the Mira Bhayander Vasai Virar (MBVV) Commissionerate Madhukar Pandey.

A resident of Vasai, Walkar's father demanded action against the Tuling and Manickpur police stations, for failing to act on his daughter's November 2020 domestic violence complaint against her live-in partner Aaftab Poonawala.

After meeting Pandey on Friday, Vikas said:

“I wanted some information regarding the complaint fiuled by my daughter in 2020. So, I have filed a plea for the same. That might be useful for the case in the future. I have also comaplined about Aaftab’s family to the police commissioner. Aaftab’s family had all the information still did not say anything.”

Meanwhile, speaking on the meeting, Kirit Somaiya said, “We talked for more than 40 minutes. They spoke to Delhi Police officials in front of us. Though Aaftab Poonawala has filed a plea for bail, police have assured us that the investigation is going on and that they will not give permission for his bail."

In November this year, Poonawala was arrested by the Delhi Police for allegedly killing Sharddha in May at their rented house in Delhi's Chhattarpur.

The meeting comes a month after the murder case made national headlines.

Poonawala allegedly murdered his live-in partner of three years in May this year and then chopped her body into at least 35 pieces. After storing them in a fridge at their rented Chhattarpur house, the 28-year-old allegedly disposed of the parts at various locations in Delhi over a span of two months.

Meanwhile, accused Poonawala has moved an application in Delhi's Saket Court seeking bail in the matter, news agency PTI reported. He has been in judicial custody after police interrogation. His bail plea will be heard on Saturday, 17 December.

Delhi Police Receives Polygraph and Forensic Reports

Sagar Preet Hooda, Special Commisioner of Police, Law and Order, Delhi Police, on Thursday, 15 December, had said:

"Police have received both (DNA and polygraph test) reports. This will help police in further investigation. The recovered body remains will be sent for post-mortem examination. The probe is underway."

He added that the reports were received from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL). The post-mortem is most likely to be conducted at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Delhi.

The sensational murder case had come to the fore in November after Delhi Police arrested Poonawala, two months after Walkar's father Vikas had registered a missing person's complaint with the Mumbai police. The couple had moved from Mumbai to Delhi in May.

Meanwhile, Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena has approved the police's proposal for the appointment of special public prosecutors to represent the state in the murder case.

Advocates Madhukar Pandey and Amit Prasad will now represent Delhi Police as special public prosecutors in the matter.

Investigation So Far

The Delhi Police had earlier conducted a polygraph test and a narco-analysis test on Poonawala to better establish the motive, suspecting that he was lying to mislead the police.

Police teams have conducted searches at the Mehrauli forest, the flat in Chhatarpur where the crime allegedly took place, Gurugram, Maharashtra, Uttarakhand's Dehradun, and some parts of Himachal Pradesh.

The accused, who was employed at a call centre in Gurugram at the time of his arrest, is suspected to have discarded the body parts and the weapon on his way to work at night.

After the searches, more than 13 body parts, mostly skeletal remains, including a jaw and a femur bone, were recovered from several locations.

All the collected evidence was sent for forensic analysis to determine whether they were human bones and if they indeed were Walkar’s.