When 15 nudes sparked UPSC aspirant's murder: Lovers' dark cover-up unravels

New Delhi:  A chilling conspiracy has unravelled following the death of 32-year-old civil services aspirant Ram Kesh Meena, whose charred body was discovered amid a fire in his North Delhi flat on October 6th. The investigation has revealed that Meena's alleged fetish for storing private visuals of at least 15 women on a hard disk was the central motive behind his murder, followed by a botched attempt to stage the scene as an accidental gas leak.

Police have arrested Meena's live-in partner, Amrita Chauhan, her ex-boyfriend Sumit Kashyap, and their mutual friend Sandeep Kumar in connection with the crime. According to Amrita's confession, Meena had refused to delete her private videos from a hard disk, a refusal that enraged Sumit when Amrita shared the grievance with him. This shared anger purportedly led them to plot Meena's murder, with the retrieval of the hard disk being a primary objective.

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Further disturbing revelations emerged as police discovered that the hard disk, along with other devices belonging to Meena, contained private visuals of at least 15 other women, allegedly stored without their consent.

Special Commissioner of Police, Law and Order, Ravindra Yadav, stated that Amrita and Sumit feared Meena might circulate her private videos online, intensifying their resolve to silence him permanently.

The horrific murder and subsequent cover-up attempt occurred late on October 5th. Sumit and Sandeep allegedly assaulted and strangled Meena to death. To create the illusion of an accident, they then doused his body with oil, ghee, and wine to fuel a fire.

Police reports indicate that Sumit then deliberately opened a gas cylinder from the kitchen, allowing gas to fill the room. With Meena's laptops, the crucial hard disk, and other belongings already removed, Sumit ignited the gas with a lighter and locked the apartment from the outside. The cylinder subsequently exploded, causing the fire.

The perpetrators' plan, however, began to unravel due to inconsistencies that piqued the investigators' suspicion. Initially, the police considered a gas leak or an exploding air conditioner as the cause of the blaze, given the damage to the AC unit. But as Special Commissioner Yadav noted, "the story did not add up. Things did not fall into place," prompting a deeper investigation.

Amrita Chauhan's phone being switched off after the incident initially hampered the investigation. However, police apprehended her on October 18th after several raids. During interrogation, she implicated Sumit Kashyap and Sandeep Kumar, who were subsequently arrested on October 21st and 23rd, respectively.

While police confirmed the discovery of private visuals of at least 15 women on the hard disk, Special Commissioner Yadav declined to comment further, citing the absence of additional complaints and the potential for causing stigma to the individuals involved.

However, he confirmed the presence of these compromising videos on Meena's devices. The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and privacy laws clearly stipulate that capturing or disseminating private images without consent is a punishable offence, carrying jail terms of up to seven years for repeat convictions under Section 77 of BNS.