Serial killings in Bengaluru: 3 women’s bodies at 3 railway stations in 3 months

Mystery shrouds the discovery of a woman’s body in a storage drum at SMVT Bengaluru, the third such incident reported from a railway station in the city in over three months.

On Monday evening, railway police were stunned to find a decomposed female corpse stuffed inside a plastic barrel near the main entrance of India’s first air-conditioned railway terminal.

Also Read | Woman's decomposed body found in drum at Bengaluru's SMVT station; cops suspect serial killer

On January 4, police had found a similarly decomposed body of a woman in a drum at the Yeshwantpur railway station. Before that, another female body was found inside a train compartment at the Baiyappanahalli railway station on December 6, 2022.

Serial killer?

All the women were in their 30s and remain unidentified. Police saw a pattern in the diabolical murders and suspected a serial killer.

Police investigations into the latest incident show that three men had arrived in an auto-rickshaw with the drum. They carried it into the station, kept it near the automatic sliding door and scooted off.

Police are trying to check the auto’s registration number and trace its owner, a senior officer said.

The woman’s face had turned black by the time her body was discovered between 7.30 pm and 8 pm.

Police believe that she was killed no more than 48 hours earlier. Her body has been preserved at CV Raman Hospital after doctors carried out an autopsy.

“The body wasn’t highly decomposed,” a senior railway police officer said. “We will know the exact cause of death after doctors give us the post-mortem report. Since it’s a sensitive case, we have asked for an early report, which may come in a day or two.”

Efforts to identify the woman haven’t given any results. Her pictures have been sent to police stations across Karnataka and the neighbouring states to check if a missing person complaint has been filed.

On January 4, police found the similarly decomposed body of a woman in a blue drum on platform number 1 of the Yeshwantpur railway station. She was aged between 30 and 35.

Before that, a female corpse was found stuffed in gunny sacks and blankets inside a compartment of train number 06527 (Bangarpet-SMVT Bengaluru Express) at Baiyappanahalli railway station on December 6, 2022. She was of similar age. She was smothered but her body hadn’t decomposed.

The body found in Yeshwantpur was highly decomposed and the face was totally disfigured. The cause of death was multiple external injuries. Police could only retrieve her jewellery and clothes.

A senior officer said that it didn’t look like a case of serial killing but didn’t rule it out either. “We have some clues about the killers and are working 24x7 to track them down,” he said.