Six arrested for January 10 double murder in Kotagiri

R Ramachandran, 38, and D Thimman, 19, both hailing from Sholur Mattam tribal village, near Kotagiri, were found dead in the morning on January 10 at a farm, where they were employed as guards. They were hacked to death and were found with bleeding injuries.

The bodies of the deceased persons were handed over to their relatives following a post-mortem at Coonoor Government Hospital.

Investigations by the police revealed that prime accused Babu, 40, from the same village had masterminded the murder as Thimmanwas having a love affair withhis daughter.

He also had a quarrel with Thimmanover the issue. The police arrested Babu and his five other accomplices, J Kumar, 55, Mahendran, 41, K Kumar, 41, Krishnan, 40, and Murthy, 39, all hailing from the same neighbourhood.

The police said the other victim Ramachandran also had an issue with the murderers over taking up cultivation on a poramboke land. “He had cleaned up a piece of poramboke land for cultivation. Five others K Kumar, Murthy, Krishnan, Mahendran and J Kumar had a quarrel demanding a portion of the land for them too. This led to enmity and they too joined Babu to kill the duo,” the police said.

On the day of the incident, Ramachandran and Thimman were fast asleep, when the six persons attacked them with sickles killing theduo on the spot.