On
28 November, A. L. Narayana, a senior police officer from Nagarkurnool, was the
first person to speak to the petrified wife over the phone. Her name was Swathi
Reddy. Her speech was incoherent. Four assailants unknown to the family had
attacked her husband, thrown acid and petrol on his face, set fire to it and
fled. Swathi was trying to get her husband to the hospital. Her neighbours had
advised her to report the assault to the police.
“You
don’t need to come to the police station. I’ll see you at the hospital.” Said
Mr Narayana. A young woman whose husband was disfigured in an assault should be
given all possible help, the police officer thought, getting into his jeep.
He
met Swathi Reddy at Hyderabad’s well-known Apollo hospital. She stood shaken
and crying next to her husband, Sudhakar Reddy. Mr Reddy lay on the hospital
bed bare-chested, wearing just a pair of jeans. His ash-coloured face had
patches that showed how unevenly the face had burnt. Burn marks were also
visible on his neck, shoulders and chest. An oxygen mask was attached to his
face. His eyes were shut. A bad job this, thought Narayana. God knows if the
victim would ever recover his original face.
Narayana
started filling out the required details himself. He could do that much for the
ill-fated woman. Swathi Reddy was 27. She was a trained nurse and worked in a
clinic. Her husband was 32. He had a stone crushing business. They were married
for seven years, and had two children.
‘Where
were the children at the time of the attack?’ Narayana asked.
Fortunately,
they were with their grandmother. Swathi had dropped them off at her mother’s
house only the previous day.
The
police officer wrote out descriptions of the four strangers who had poured acid
and petrol over Mr Reddy’s face. Swathi was screaming at the top of her voice,
so the culprits had run away. Another few minutes and they would have succeeded
in killing Mr Reddy.
Nothing
was stolen. Swathi Reddy could not say if her husband had any enemies. She
certainly didn’t know. Her husband’s business was a small scale enterprise.
They owned a car, but other than that it was a middle class family. It was
unlikely the assault was related to Mr Reddy’s financial affairs.
Apollo
hospital was expensive. Mr Reddy’s brother stood in the corner of the room. He
had somehow managed to cough up Rs 350,000. Far more would be needed until
Sudhakar could get his face repaired and go back home.
‘Will
you please talk to the plastic surgeon?’ Swathi said to Narayana. ‘They should
do a plastic surgery urgently. I can’t bear to see his face.’
Narayana
didn’t understand why the police should speak to the surgeon. Surely, surgeons
knew their business well. On the other hand, you had here a woman in shock. She
worked as a nurse; she probably knew the way hospitals functioned.
‘I’d
taken him to a private clinic before coming here. That clinic specialises in
plastic surgery. They refused to admit my husband, saying this was a police
case. So, we had to bring him here.’ said Swathi. ‘This hospital’s doctor said the
burn injuries are not deep enough for plastic surgery. What does he mean? Look
at my husband’s face. Anyone can tell he needs plastic surgery.’
Narayana
made sympathetic noises. He took Mr Reddy’s brother out of the room, and asked
him similar questions. He didn’t know anything. Sudhakar had not yet said a
single word. Yes, his face had become unrecognisable.
‘It’s
horrible.’ Said Mr Reddy’s brother. ‘It’s not only his face. Something terrible
has happened to him. I couldn’t recognise him at all.’
*****
Mr
Reddy’s brother called the police station the following day. This time, he
s0unded as agitated as Mr Reddy’s wife had the previous day.
‘Is
your brother all right?’ asked Mr Narayana.
‘No...
I mean... I don’t know. My mother and I would like to see you urgently.’
In
less than half an hour, the two had landed at the police station. Narayana
offered them water.
‘Sir,
this man... this man can’t be my brother.’ The visitor looked at his mother,
who suddenly broke out crying.
‘Hang
on; you said yesterday he was unrecognisable. And I’ve seen his face. It’s
quite understandable...’
‘No,
no. This man can’t be my brother. Both my mother and I thought it was very
strange how an acid attack could change his height and overall appearance. When
we tried to talk to him, he wrote. He refused to say a word.’
‘It’s
possible he is not in a position to talk yet.’ Narayana offered.
‘The
hospital offered him lunch. The plate contained a nice, hot mutton soup.
Sudhakar, my brother, loves mutton soups. This man, whoever he is, told the
nurse he is a vegetarian. He is not my brother, he is an imposter.’
‘But
his wife... Mrs Reddy... what does she say to that?’
‘That’s
what is strange.’ Mr Reddy’s mother spoke for the first time. ‘She says we’re
all wrong. The assault has affected him badly. She maintains the man as her
husband. We can tell you he’s not.’
‘Well,’
Narayana thought, ‘the wife says the disfigured man is her husband. The
husband’s family says he is an imposter. Why should the wife lie?’
Narayana
contacted Mr Jogu Chennaiah, the Additional Superintendent of Police. The case
warranted someone senior.
*****
An
Aadhar card is a biometric
identity document introduced by the Indian government. De facto it is
mandatory, because it must now be linked with bank accounts and mobile SIM
cards. When you apply for an Aadhar, you submit fingerprints which enter
the world’s largest biometric database.
When
the Nagarkurnool police visited the private room in the Apollo hospital, the man
with the disfigured face was asleep. Mrs Swathi Reddy had gone to see her
children. Narayana took the electronic device out of his pocket. He delicately
pressed the fingers of the sleeping man on its screen.
Within
an hour the police officer was standing next to a man in the government lab.
‘Good
fingerprints.’ said the man. ‘They match exactly.’
‘What’s
the name?’ asked Mr Narayana.
‘Rajesh
Ajjakolu.’ said the lab assistant. ‘Here are his contact details.’
*****
Rajesh
Ajjakolu worked as a physiotherapist. Two years ago, Mrs Swathi Reddy, a mother
of two, consulted him about her backache. A young woman visiting a young male
physiotherapist is a tricky situation. The two fell in love and started an
affair. In India, with more than two billion prying eyes, it’s difficult to
keep an affair secret for too long.
On
23 November, some of Sudhakar Reddy’s relatives saw his wife with a stranger in
a car. They promptly informed Sudhakar. Sudhakar confronted Swathi and they had
four unpleasant days full of quarrels, suspicion and fights. Swathi took the
two children and left them at her mother’s house. She then spoke to Rajesh, her
lover. They decided to get rid of Sudhakar. But after killing Sudhakar, Swathi
and Rajesh wished to live a happy family life together. How to manage that?
*****
Three
years ago, Swathi had seen the popular Telugu film Yevadu. She loved it.
In Yevadu, a young man (Allu Arjun) suffers facial injuries when a mafia
man tries to kill him. A lady plastic surgeon saves him by giving him the face
of her deceased son (Ram Charan). One man dies and another starts living with
his face, thanks to the great innovation called plastic surgery. Once Rajesh
gets Sudhakar’s face, Swathi and Rajesh would move to Pune with her children
and live happily ever after.
*****
Early
morning on 27 November, Swathi gave her husband an anaesthetic injection. She
was a professional nurse, after all. She and Rajesh then clobbered him to death
with an iron rod. They took him to an isolated spot 150 km away from
Nagarkurnool, and burned him after dousing his body in petrol.
On
their return, Swathi poured acid and petrol on Rajesh’s face and lit a match. For
love, it appears, men are willing to suffer much. Swathi waited until Rajesh’s face was
sufficiently burnt. She then began screaming; hoping that the neighbours would
soon turn up to see the disfigured face of her husband.
*****
Sudhakar
Reddy’s family spent Rs 500,000 on the treatment and on learning the truth,
stopped. As a result, the hospital has refused to let Rajesh go until someone
pays the balance hospital bill. The police have promised to take Rajesh to jail
as soon as the hospital releases him.
Swathi
Reddy is already in jail. That was the price she had to pay for failing to
appreciate that a perfect plastic surgery can happen only in films.
Ravi
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