Jharkhand policeman sentenced to life imprisonment for killing girlfriend

An assistant sub-inspector of police was sentenced to life imprisonment by a court in Jharkhand's Jamshedpur on Tuesday for killing his girlfriend by crushing her head and then strangling her. Dharmendra Kumar Singh, 39, who was posted at Sakchi police station, allegedly killed Varsha Patel and dumped her body in a pond in November 2021.

Principal District and Sessions Judge Amit Kumar Mishra sentenced Singh to life imprisonment after convicting him under Section 302 of the IPC (murder). 

Varsha (32), a resident of South Park, went missing on November 12, 2021, and her sister Jaya filed a complaint at the Bistupur police station. According to the police, Singh was in a relationship with Varsha for over a year.

Singh told the police that she often blackmailed him to extort money and also prevented him from visiting his native place in Bihar's Bhojpur district. Fed up with the blackmail, Singh quit the service and allegedly planned to kill her.

He took Varsha to his residence in the Telco area and crushed Varsha's head before strangling her to death after an argument. He then stuffed her body in a plastic bag and dumped it in a pond in the Telco police station area. Singh threw Varsha's belongings in the Subarnarekha river and her mobile phone in the bushes in Bistupur area. He then went to his native village in Bihar. The decomposed body was spotted by sanitation workers in the pond on November 18.

Varsha's family members identified the body from her gold bangles, chain and clothes, police said. After a thorough investigation, some suspects were detained for questioning and based on the evidence collected, Singh was arrested from his native village.