Surat: Twenty-four years after he allegedly strangled his wife in Ahmedabad and fled, a 58-year-old man was arrested by the Surat Detection of Crime Branch (DCB) from Rajula in Amreli district.Police said the accused had evaded arrest by living under different identities and working as a labourer at various places across the country.The accused, identified as Yadav alias Sarbi (58), was arrested from a residential complex near Hindola Chowkdi in Rajula, where he had recently arrived for welding work.The murder case was registered at Vatva GIDC police station in Ahmedabad in 2002.Additional commissioner of police (crime) Dr Karanraj Vaghela told TOI that the incident occurred on Nov 14, 2002. Yadav allegedly strangled his wife, Pratibha, following an argument over her continued association with her former husband, Sanjay Patil. He allegedly placed her body inside a drum, locked the house and fled.The body was discovered about four days later after neighbours noticed a foul smell coming from the locked house.“After absconding for 24 years and living in different states, including Bihar, West Bengal, Jharkhand, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi, he recently came to Gujarat for work, where our team tracked him down and arrested him,” Vaghela said.Police said Yadav had earlier been married to Maya, who died during pregnancy after giving birth to their son Rakesh. Pratibha had previously been married to Patil and had three children from that marriage — two daughters and a son, Lallan. Despite their divorce, Pratibha allegedly remained in contact with Patil, leading to frequent arguments between her and Yadav.After allegedly killing Pratibha, Yadav stayed in the house overnight and fled the next morning with his two young sons, Rakesh and Lallan. He boarded a train from Ahmedabad railway station to Howrah and then returned to his native place in Bihar, where he worked in agriculture and as a labourer.A breakthrough came after crime branch inspector Vijay Bharwad received information that Yadav was living near Rajula while concealing his identity.A team led by inspectors H M Gadhvi and Bharwad subsequently launched a search operation and arrested him from the residential complex near Hindola Chowkdi.During questioning, Yadav allegedly disclosed details of the crime to police. Investigators also learnt that he had remarried in 2010 and has four children from the marriage.Cop pursued case for eight yearsPolice said inspector Vijay Bharwad had been pursuing the case for nearly eight years. He began working on it while posted as a police sub-inspector with the Ahmedabad Crime Branch in 2019-20. He continued tracking the accused during his subsequent postings with the Ahmedabad Rural LCB and ATS and later after joining the Surat Crime Branch.
