A female intern has admitted and been arrested for killing the editor of ‘India Unbound’ news magazine in Maharashtra’s Thane district and then disposing of his body.
The deceased identified as Nityanand Pandey, who worked as the group editor of a magazine, had gone missing since March 15 and his dead body was found on Sunday, March 17 in Maharashtra.
During investigations, police questioned his trainee journalist Ankita Mishra who admitted to killing Pandey. She revealed that Pandey was repeatedly abusing and harassing her sexually since two years and her repeated requests to stop had fallen on deaf ears.
Therefore, she hatched a plan with the magazine’s printer to get rid of Pandey.
On Friday, she took Pandey to an isolated spot on the pretext of showing him a property and gave him a protein drink spiked with sedatives. Pandey fell unconscious after which he was strangulated and his body was dumped at in Bhiwandi.
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Addressing a press conference Monday, Thane Superintendent of Police Shivaji Rathod said the killing was the result of alleged sexual harassment faced by the arrested woman at the hands of Pandey over the last two years.
“Based on our probe, we have arrested Ankita Mishra, who worked as an assistant to Pandey, and Satish Umashankar Mishra (34), who ran a printing press where the deceased’s news magazine was printed,” Rathod told reporters.
“Ankita was working with Pandey for three years and she has said she was facing sexual harassment at his hands for two years. She then conspired with Satish to eliminate him,” he said.
“On March 15, the two accused took Pandey on the pretext of showing him a row house in Uttan. They spiked his protein drink which rendered Pandey unconscious. They then strangled him and threw his body in a creek near Khardi village,” he said.
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A case under sections 302 (murder) and 201 (disappearance of evidence) of the Indian Penal Code has been registered against the two accused, the SP said.
India Unbound, a bilingual magazine featured interviews with senior government officers and is regularly seen at offices of several IAS and IPS officials, apart from features on cooking, fashion and lifestyle features.
