A 36-year-old woman and her four-year-old daughter were found brutally murdered in their apartment in South Bengaluru on Wednesday, police said.
Yamuna and her daughter Ratanya were beaten and stabbed to death in their third-floor apartment in Chowdeshwari Layout near Begur.
The killings were discovered late in the evening when a sister of Yamuna's came to see her. She called Yamuna's husband Channaveera Swamy, a garment employee who was away at work, before alerting the police. A Hoysala police patrol car arrived at the spot soon after and cordoned off the area.
Police believe the killings took place after Swamy left for work in the morning. The killer — police suspect that it was only one person — hammered Yamuna and Ratanya multiple times with a sharp metal object besides stabbing them.
"For now, we don't know if any valuables are missing from the house. Yamuna's jewellery was found on the floor. It seems she tried hard to fight off the killer," a senior police officer said.
Another senior officer said there was no sign of forced entry into the house. But it's not clear if Yamuna had locked the house from the inside or just shut the door.
Police are said to have got clues about the killer from CCTV footage and are also questioning neighbours if they saw anyone going into the family's house after Swamy left for work.
Sniffer dogs scoured the area while fingerprint and forensic experts collected samples.
S Murugan, Additional Commissioner of Police (East), and Srinath Mahadev Joshi, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Southeast), were among the senior officers who visited the crime scene.
Murugan said: "Four teams have been formed to solve the case. Efforts are under way to nab the assailants."
A case of murder has been registered at the Begur police station.
Swamy and Yamuna hailed from the Chitradurga district and had been married for 15 years.
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