Murderer caught 9 months after burning alive his wife

A man who donned the garbs of a saint to escape the law after setting his wife ablaze was arrested nine months after the murder.

He was carrying a reward of Rs 10,000 on his head.
Giriraj Sharma had killed his wife Kusum in September last year after suspecting her of being in an illicit affair.

Married for 16 years at the time of the crime, the couple used to have frequent altercations over this issue.

Sharma, a drug addict, was unemployed then and had been living on his wife’s earnings.
On September 24 last year, Sharma decided to eliminate Kusum and lured her to railway tracks near Sarai Rohilla railway station on the pretext of showing her his first place of job.

Upon reaching the tracks, Sharma poured petrol on her and set her on fire.
He then fled from the spot. Some eyewitnesses doused the blaze and rushed her to Safdarjung Hospital.

She revealed it all to police in her dying declaration.
A case was registered and a cash reward of Rs 10,000 declared on his arrest after he was found absconding.

Police finally learnt about his whereabouts on Monday.
Someone known to him had seen him roaming around in the Nigam Bodh Ghat area.
A raid was conducted and Sharma arrested.
He revealed during interrogation that he had fled to Kasganj in UP immediately after the crime.

Fake impression
He began living there in the disguise of a ‘Naga Baba’.
“He had also installed a Hanuman idol there and indulged in predicting lucky numbers of gamblers in the area,” said police on Tuesday. He told people that he practised “tantra vidya” and lived mostly in cremation ground.

‘Cannibal’
“He even claimed to have eaten leftover human flesh after burning of pyre as well as raw flesh of animals such as snakes and dogs,” said police.