Cops await DNA test in Cuffe Parade case

MUMBAI: The arrest of a 20-year-old man, Krishna Pawar, for trying to kidnap a five-year-old girl from Ambedkar Nagar chawl on Saturday had raised hopes of the residents and police officials that they were close to cracking the Cuffe Parade serial killings case. However, two days on, there is little progress in the probe and senior officers admitted this could be a false alarm.
“We have arrested him and are interrogating him. However, there is little to prove he was behind the murders of the two children from Cuffe Parade. Residents of the area are nervous and jittery ever since the murders and are alert about any suspicious men. This has helped us prevent abductions but have proved to be merely false alarms as far as the murder probe goes,” said an officer of the Cuffe Parade police station.
Assistant commissioner of police (Colaba division) Iqbal Shaikh confirmed they had not made any breakthrough in the dual murder investigations. “Currently we have booked him only for attempt to kidnap. We have sent his samples for a DNA test and will have to wait for the results to make any assessment,” he said. The police had obtained DNA samples of the accused from the clothes of the victims recovered at the murder site.
The police had made a similar arrest last month when a 32-year-old man was caught by residents while trying to kidnap a four-year-old girl in the same area. Police had initially suspected his role in the murders but a negative DNA result ruled out this possibility. In February, the crime branch had also arrested a fisherman after an informer told the police the fisherman had confessed to murdering the girls. This man too had to be released after the police failed to gather any clinching evidence against him.
“This is a difficult probe. We have interrogated hundreds of suspects and even detained some men. We don’t have any leads as of now but efforts are on as this is a priority case for us,” said Shaikh.