Jharsuguda : Additional session and District Judge, Kamlesh Jagadalla, sentenced former MLA Anup Sai to life imprisonment for murdering a 35-year-old woman and her teenage daughter in the year 2016.
The court, however, acquitted the driver of Sai, Bardhan Toppo who had also been arrested as an accomplice to the highly sensational double murder case.
Sai had been arrested by Chakardharnagar Police of Raigarh in Chhattishgarh on 12 February 2020 and lodged in Raigarh Jail.
Anup Sai was the prime accused in the double murder case as he eliminated Kalpana Das and her daughter Babli Das. Sai was arrested under Section 302 (Murder) 201 (Causing disappearance of the evidence), 120 B ( Conspiracy) and 34 IPC by Cyber cell police of Chakradhar Nagar police
Anup Sai, who was elected MLA thrice from Brajrajnagar assembly seat on Congress ticket in 2000,2004 and 2209. Late he re-joined BJD and unsuccessfully contested for the same seat in 2014.
Bodies of the duo, mother and daughter got discovered at Sakambari plant, Near Hamirpur under Chakradharpur Nagar Police station in Raigarh District on May 6, 2016. Police lodged cases of unnatural deaths of two unidentified women. In the year 2017, the identification of the dead woman was done by one of the relatives who was a police constable in Brajrajnagar after seeing the photos in the Police station.
The charge sheet said that Sai murdered Kalpana and her daughter to get rid of Kapana’s pressure to get married. Kalpana, who is a native of Brajrajnagar had come close to Sai after being divorced by her husband in the year 2005. Since then, she had been living in a three-storied flat in the Sundarpada area of Bhubaneswar. Sai was already married and had no intention of marrying her, the prosecution said.
On the pretext of the false promise of marrying her in the temple in Raigarh. Sai allegedly took Kalpana and her daughter and, on the way, murdered them in the late evening.
Raigarh police later arrested Anup Sai and her driver in February 2020, Sai was in Judicial custody for the past two years, whereas his driver Bardhan Toppo was out on bail since October last year.
Sai’s Counsel said that they will appeal against the verdict in the high court.
