'Collapsed and died during puja': UP techie’s death wasn’t heart attack but murder; wife wanted to claim his railway job, say kin

BIJNOR: When a 29-year-old railway technician suddenly "collapsed during a puja" at his Najibabad home on Friday evening, his wife told the family it was a heart attack.The grieving relatives, shocked but unsuspecting, prepared for a quiet farewell. But since Deepak Kumar held a govt job, the family insisted on an autopsy before the last rites. By Sunday, everything had changed — the postmortem examination revealed he had been strangled.What began as a tragedy is now being investigated as murder.Police on Sunday arrested Deepak's 27-year-old wife, Shivani, for allegedly killing him with the help of an unidentified accomplice. The motive, according to the victim's family, was "to claim his railway job after his death". Bijnor SP (city) Sanjeev Vajpayee said, "A case has been registered against Shivani and an unknown person, and legal action will be taken based on the evidence."Deepak, originally from Bijnor's Mukrandpur village, had been living in a rented house in Adarsh Nagar colony, Najibabad. He married Shivani, a resident of Chauharpur Nahtaur, on June 17, 2023. It was a love marriage, and the couple had a six-month-old son.The victim's brother, Piyush, told police that Shivani had long been hostile towards them. "She even used to beat her mother-in-law," he alleged. Deepak's mother, Pushpa, added. "She killed him with someone's help to get his job." Before joining the railways in March 2023, Deepak had served in the CRPF in Manipur. He had left the paramilitary job in hope of settling down and building a peaceful life with his family. But less than a year into that new beginning, his life ended abruptly, leaving behind a grieving family and a toddler.