3 held in Dhenkanal 9 years after murder

ANGUL: The Dhenkanal town police on Monday arrested three persons and claimed to have solved a nine-year-old murder case in which a 24-year-old man was hacked to death and the body buried to cover up the crime. The deceased has been identified as Dolagobinda Behera of Sundarikhal village under Dhenkanal town police station limits.
Those arrested include Santosh Pradhan (55), Dilip Naik (40) and Batakrishna Dehury (27).
A case was lodged at Dhenkanal town police station by Dolagobinda's father Sachidananda (58) on July 23, 2013, when he didn't return home.
Dolagobinda had a hardware shop in Dhenkanal town had had gone to eat at a dhaba. After that, he was on his way home in a bicycle. Sachidananda tried to contact him on his mobile phone, but found it switched off.
Despite police's best efforts, they failed to trace Dolagobinda. It remained an unsolved mystery all these years. But some days back police got information of three men bragging about a murder in an inebriated condition. The police swung into action and picked up the three. During interrogation, they confessed to their crime and also showed the place where they had buried the body.
Dhenkanal IIC Rajendra Kumar Mohapatra said the three killed Dolagobinda thinking him to be a goat thief.
"The accused then dug up a hole and buried his body in a nursery," the IIC said.
"The accused have confessed to their crime. As per their statement, a police team went to the spot identified by the accused. We recovered two bone fragments," Rajendra Kumar added. The bones were sent to Bhubaneswar for forensic test and further investigation is on.