Minor stabs woman advocate to avenge father’s externment

NAGPUR: Advocate Rajashree Tandon, 53, was stabbed to death inside a photo studio by a 15-year-old neighbour, at Manavsewa Nagar, Seminary Hills, on Friday. The fierce assault left the knife broken, with the blade in her skull. The minor, Gittikhadan police station sources said, wanted to avenge his father’s externment and other losses suffered by his family due to the woman’s complaints.
The juvenile, whose blows also severed Rajashree’s right index finger, had just appeared for Std Xth board exam. Rajashree had seven offences against her at Ambazari and Gittikhadan police stations, including extortion.
On Friday, Rajashree abused the minor and his family on the road, and even slapped him. Enraged, the minor got a knife and followed Rajashree as she headed to a medicine shop. She spotted him and tried to run, but he attacked her. He followed her into a studio and repeatedly stabbed her. The juvenile, who later burned his blood smeared clothes, was picked up by cops from a relative’s place at Koradi.
Rajashree had first complained against the assailant’s grandfather when he purchased a plot. Later, the minor’s father was externed by city police after Rajashree’s lobbying at various levels. In the last few months, Rajashree got two shops and some portion of the minor’s property razed by NIT through repeated complaints.
Rajashree’s husband, a DCP once posted to the city, too had faced Rajashree’s wrath, when she created a ruckus outside Mumbai airport while trying to stop him from boarding a flight. Sources in the police department said a magistrate who was close to Rajashree too was harassed by her, and later ended his life.