TIRUPATI: A 56-year-old wife, who witnessed her 59-year-old husband's brutal murder, died of cardiac arrest in Anantapur late on Sunday.
The deceased were identified as Murthy Rao Gokhale and his wife, Shobha Gokhale.
According to Anantapur I Town Circle Inspector Reddeppa, the tragic incident unfolded at an apartment in LIC Colony, opposite the JNTU campus in Anantapur.
The deceased, Murthy Rao Gokhale, was working as a guest faculty at SK University and had earlier served as the principal of Ananta Lakshmi Engineering College.
Police said the accused was identified as Adithya, who happened to be the niece of the deceased.
Adithya, who completed a master's degree in engineering, reportedly paid an undisclosed amount of money to his uncle Murthy Rao Gokhale to secure placement at a reputed company. But after Murthy Rao failed to fulfill his promise and started avoiding his calls, Adithya developed a grudge against his uncle and hatched a plan to eliminate him.
According to his plan, Adithya arrived at Gokhale's house late on Sunday and engaged in a heated argument with him. He later attacked Gokhale with a knife that he brought along, slit his throat and inflicted several cutting injuries all over his body, leading to his immediate death.
Though Gokhale's wife Shobha attempted to save her husband, she was also attacked and injured. Unfortunately, Shobha, who witnessed her husband's murder, died of cardiac arrest a few hours later.
Anantapur I Town police, who registered a case, managed to arrest Adithya and are currently questioning him.
The bodies of the couple were sent for postmortem to the Government General Hospital in Anantapur.