Senior citizen murdered, dumped in Ahmednagar

PUNE: Amid rising incidents of robbers attacking and looting senior citizens, an elderly woman from Aundh has been found brutally murdered.
The body of Saroja Srinivasan (73), a resident of Siddharth Nagar, was dumped in a roadside bush near Parner village in Ahmednagar last week.
Srinivasan’s throat was slit, forearms were bruised and wrists gashed.When the police found her body around 11.45 am on November 25, a day after she was reported missing, they registered a case of accidental death and buried the body.
However, on Wednesday evening, the body was exhumed and the woman’s family members performed the final rites at the Vaikunth crematorium. Although Srinivasan had retired as headmistress from the Maharashtra Mandal elementary school on Tilak Road, here, she continued working there as administrator. Recuperating from the shock of her elder sister’s death, 60-year-old Sangeeta Nair (name changed) told TNN on Wednesday that Saroja would normally leave home for school around 9.30 am and return around 4 pm. On November 24, when she didn’t turn up for work, school authorities informed her relatives.
When scores of frantic phone calls to near and dear ones and stop-overs at nearly 20 hospitals did not yield any results, Srinivasan’s nephew, Rangaswamy Shridhar, filed a complaint with the Chatushrungi police.
Nair said that Pune, once known as pensioners’ paradise, had become a killers’ haven. “They killed my sister like an animal and stole her bangles, chain and earrings,� she said. Srinivasan has been leading a solitary life in her flat at Siddharath Nagar (wing-A), building no.7, for the past 13 years following her husband’s death. Her husband worked as a senior barrack stores officer in the Military Engineering Service (MES). An angry K.A. Nair, brother-in-law of the deceased, said they were shocked to learn from the police that Saroja was found murdered in Parner.
"I feel like killing the crooks. How could they kill a helpless woman like her," he asked. The Parner police have registered a case under Section 302 (murder) of the Indian Penal Code. Inspector Bhausaheb Surdekar of the Parner police is investigating the case. A team from the Chatushrungi police station, Pune, was dispatched to Parner on Tuesday. Old-timers and friends closely associated with Srinivasan said she was an excellent cook and a good housekeeper. “She loved teaching and interacting with children," recalled a neighbour.