Aftab, Shraddha argued over who should pay for Mumbai trip: Report

Poonawalla told police that he had refused Shraddha's request to fetch their belongings from Mumbai and had been urging her to vacate their Chattarpur apartment

Aftab Poonawalla, the accused in the murder of Shraddha Walkar, told police that one of the couple's arguments was over who should pay for a trip to Mumbai to fetch their belongings, according to a report in The Indian Express.

Poonawalla had allegedly murdered Walkar on May 18, which was apparently just days after they had moved to the Chattarpur area in the national capital. He then purportedly spent the next few months disposing of parts of Shraddha's body before the case came to light.

Investigators said that Poonawalla told them about money issues becoming a factor in the couple’s relationship after both of them left their Mumbai jobs and backpacked across Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand. The couple finally landed in Delhi and rented a house for Rs 9,000, police said in the report.

Poonawalla told police that he had refused Shraddha's request to fetch their belongings from Mumbai and had been urging her to vacate their apartment in Chattarpur, the IE report said.

"The accused claims that they both fought and broke up some time ago but decided to stay as flatmates till one of them got a job," a senior police officer told the publication. "We can't entirely rely on his statements because he could also be trying to mislead us. We have asked the court for permission to conduct a narco-analysis test on him."

"Based on his confession, it has been pointed out that he would allegedly walk out with the body parts at 1 to 2 am at night," the officer said. "We are now looking for the exact footage and if something is seen in his hands. It is a difficult task to recover all the CCTV footage from May because most of the systems don’t have the storage capacity that can be accessed for older footage. We have still managed to get some visuals from the area from that time."

Police said they had recovered two pieces of evidence - traces of blood and a bag that allegedly belonged to Shraddha - that could help them in their investigation.

Since Poonawalla's arrest on Saturday, police teams have recovered at least 10 suspected human body parts. However, the murder weapon and Shraddha's phone have not been recovered yet.

(With agency inputs)