Bangalore:
The police arrested a married man on Thursday for the gruesome murder of his 28-year-old Israeli girlfriend.
Yoga teacher Lokesh Chandra Das (35) killed Tamar Farha about three weeks ago and stuffed her body into a large freezer.
The crime would have gone undetected had it not been for the frequent power cuts in the city. Das met Farha at a yoga camp in Rishikesh in 2007 and the two were having an affair since then.
However, Das got married to Jyothi in 2008 and had a child with her. Jyothi was unaware of her husband's affair and Farha was living with the couple on the 11th floor of a posh apartment building in the up-market Kannakapura Road area after returning from Israel recently.
On April 15, Das returned to find his girlfriend and wife fighting and, to defuse the situation, he dragged the former into another room.
After a heated argument, he struck her on the head with a heavy iron pipe killing her instantly. He put her body in the bathtub, filled it with water, emptied a few bottles of perfume and room freshener and locked the room.
After cleaning himself up, he told his wife that Farha had left and that the dispute had been settled.
Before leaving on an errand, he told her not to enter the room because he conducted yoga classes there and the place was not clean, and that she could contract some infection and pass it on to the child.
Das was afraid that someone would see him if he attempted to carry the body down from the upper floor and dispose it off somewhere on the outskirts. He then decided to buy a large freezer and store the body, hoping to dispose of it when he got the opportunity.
A few days later, he purchased a granite-cutting machine, tried to cut the body into pieces, but could not do so as it was frozen solid.
Ironically, Jyothi was staying in the adjacent room of the same apartment where the body was hidden, but Das had managed to convince her that he had stored some chemicals there and nothing was amiss.
Afraid of getting caught, Lokesh Chandra Das bought a freezer and dumped Farha's body in it.
But, because of frequent power cuts, the body began to thaw and soon a foul odour began emanating from the room. After repeated questioning by Jyothi, Das finally admitted to killing Farha.
She immediately informed her parents and they approached the city police commissioner seeking help. Based on the information, the Talaghatappura police detained Das, who confessed to the crime.
"I wanted to continue my relationship with Farha, but she was becoming increasingly possessive, so I decided to teach her a lesson," Das told the police.
Ram Nagar Superintendent of Police SB Bisnelli said, "Das is in custody and the body has been shifted to Rajarajeshwari Medical College.
We have informed the victim's parents through the Israeli embassy and are awaiting their response to go ahead with the postmortem."
Farha visited India with her parents in 2007 and met Das. After 15 days, her parents returned home and she and Das began living together for a while.
She worked as a kindergarten teacher in her country and had to return. Meanwhile, Das who was in relationship with Jyothi, proposed and they got married.