A 44-year-old man has allegedly killed his wife before dying by suicide at their residence in west Delhi’s Anand Parbat, police said on Thursday, adding that preliminary investigation suggests the incident was driven by prolonged depression.
A senior police officer said that the incident was reported at 5.26 pm on Wednesday with the caller saying there had been a “suspicious case of suicide”. The caller, later identified as the wife’s brother, told police that his brother-in-law was not responding and the room was locked from the inside.
Police reached the house in Nai Basti, where they found the door of a room locked from inside. “As repeated knocks and calls elicited no response, the door was cut open,” the officer said. Inside, they found a man and a woman who had both died.
A senior police officer said that the couple lived with their nine-year-old son and their extended family members lived close by.The child is now with the other members of the family and, at the time of the incident, he was playing outside his home.
“Initial inquiries with family members revealed that the man had been suffering from depression for nearly 13 years. He was undergoing treatment from at least two government hospitals and was on medication as well. He used to work at a company in Anand Parbat while the wife was a homemaker,” the officer said.
Based on the circumstances at the spot and a preliminary inquiry, the officer said, it appears that the man first bolted the door from inside, allegedly strangled his wife, and later died by suicide.
The crime team was called to the scene to inspect the room and collect forensic evidence. After the examination, the bodies were shifted to Ram Manohar Lohia (RML) Hospital and Lady Hardinge Medical College (LHMC), where doctors declared both victims dead. Post-mortem examinations were conducted on Thursday to ascertain the exact cause of death, police said.
Police said family members of both the deceased have not expressed any suspicion or alleged foul play. “No eyewitness has come forward so far, and family members have said that the man was under prolonged mental stress over reasons not known to them, ” the officer added.
The officer said that the woman had called her brother around 4 pm and told her that her husband was “really feeling unwell and asked him to come. When he came, no one answered the door after which he called the police,” the officer said.
Police have registered a case under section 103(1) (murder) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and taken up further investigation. Police said that they are examining all aspects, including medical history, statements of relatives, and forensic reports, to reconstruct the sequence of events.