Muskaan Rastogi had tampered with her husband’s prescription to purchase sleeping pills to drug him before killing and dismembering his body, investigating officials on Sunday said, as they provided fresh details of the grisly crime that took place in Uttar Pradesh’s Meerut earlier this month.
The officials said that Muskaan had purchased the pills from one Usha Medical Store, which was raided on Sunday as part of the probe.
“We found that she had brought the medicines from this store. We are searching this place and checking all sale records to gather details about the drug that was purchased by the accused. We are trying to ascertain if the medicine warranted a prescription before purchase or if it could be sold over the counter,” Meerut drug inspector Piyush Sharma said.
Mr Sharma said the records of all sales in the past two years are being scrutinised. “In case of any violations, a case will be filed. The shop’s licence may be cancelled. Antidepressants like sleeping pills are sold on the basis of prescriptions and medical stores have to maintain a record of such sales,” he said.
On March 4, Muskaan and Sahil Shukla, her lover, stabbed her husband, Saurabh Rajput, to death and dismembered his body, before sealing the parts inside a drum with cement. Police said Saurabh, a former Merchant Navy officer, was allegedly drugged before his murder.
Usha Medical Store owner Amit Joshi said: “Police told us that the woman purchased the medicine from our store. She had shown us the prescription on her mobile phone and we handed over the pills on the basis of that. We do not sell such medicines in the absence of a prescription.”
After committing the crime on March 4, Muskaan and Sahil set off on a vacation to Himachal Pradesh, all the while misleading the victim’s family by sending them messages from his phone, according to the police.
The murder came to light on March 18, when Muskaan confessed to her mother, who reported her to the police. Muskaan and Sahil were subsequently arrested. Saurabh was a former Merchant Navy officer.
Doctors who conducted the post-mortem reported that Saurabh was stabbed in the heart with extreme force thrice, indicating a sustained and violent attack. “The blows from the sharp long knife pierced deep inside the heart,” one of the doctors said.
The post mortem revealed that Saurabh’s head was severed from the body, both hands were cut off from the wrist and his legs were bent backwards, suggesting an attempt to fit the body in a drum. The cause of death has been attributed to shock and excessive bleeding.
Saurabh and Muskan got married in 2016 against his family’s wishes, following a relationship and they had a six-year-old daughter. Muskaan and Sahil had known each other since school and reconnected via a WhatsApp group in 2019, police said.
Asked whether Saurabh’s daughter knew about her father’s death, his mother Renu Devi said the girl had been telling neighbours, “Papa is in the drum”. “She must have seen something.”
Muskaan’s Family Refuses To Fight Case
According to Senior Jail Superintendent Viresh Raj Sharma, Muskaan has demanded a government lawyer to fight her case.
In an application, she said that since the incident, “my parents are angry with me, no one will fight for me. Therefore, I want a government lawyer who can fight my case in the court”, the official said.
“When I called Muskan, she said that her family members will not fight for her as they are angry with her, and demanded a government lawyer to fight the case,” Mr Sharma was quoted as saying by PTI.
“If a prisoner demands a government counsel, then it is our duty to provide him/her a lawyer. We have accepted her application and will send it to the court, so that she can be provided a government lawyer. However, Muskan’s lover Sahil has not yet demanded a government lawyer,” he added.
The official also said that the two accused wanted to stay together in the prison but were told that it was not possible.
(With inputs from Shyam Parmar)