Daijiworld Media Network – Puttur (SP)
Puttur, Sep 28: Giving gory details of how Umesh Rai was eliminated, main accused, Jayaraj Rai, told the divisional magistrate, K Harish Kumar, that he hit Umesh Rai’s head with a hammer, when he was resting in the porch. “Once he fell down, Ramakrishna Naik and Ramachandra Naik repeatedly hit him with wooden clubs till he lost his life,” he explained. The explanation was given, after Harish asked him to narrate the details of the murder.
“Umesh was my friend. He came to my house on his own, on March 26, uninvited. At the time, there was no one at my home. We slept after having dinner. On the next day, Ramakrishna Naik and Ramachandra Naik had come to my house as coolies to attend to some pending work. I was instructed by my brother-in-law, Ammanna Rai, to finish Umesh Rai off. We had information that Umesh had hatched a plan to execute Muttappa Rai. As a revenge for this act of treachery, I had sketched to murder Umesh Rai. Once he was murdered, we dumped his body in a gorge by the side of my plantation. His mobile phone was taken to Puttur, where two SIMs found in the mobile were handed over to Ammanna Rai. On the same night, we removed his body from the gorge and buried it by digging a pit in a hillock nearby,” he stated.
Ramachandra Naik and Ramakrishna Naik told the divisional magistrate that they had been called by Jayaraj Rai to do some work at his house, and not to execute his murder plan. “We came to know about the murder plan after reaching his home. Once Jayaraj hit Umesh with a hammer, we helped him in completing the task,” they claimed.
Local circle inspector, B K Manjaiah, got the medical tests of the four accused done, and produced them in the court on Monday, after expiry of their police custody. They were then remanded to judicial custody till October 11. Advocate for Ammanna Rai, second accused, pleaded with the court to keep his client under medical supervision to monitor his health, as he had recently undergone surgery. The court concurred with his request and passed appropriate orders.