Mumbai: A sessions court here on Monday convicted two former staffers of a salon for the 2018 murder of their 28-year-old colleague, Kirti Vyas, whose body has not yet been found. Additional Sessions Judge M G Deshpande held the accused, Siddhesh Tamhankar and his female colleague, guilty under Indian Penal Code sections, including 302 (murder) and 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence). The hearing on the quantum of punishment will be held on Tuesday.

In its final submissions, the prosecution had claimed that the murder was the result of "wanton lust".

Tamhankar has been in judicial custody since his arrest in the case in 2018. His colleague, the mother of a teenager, had secured bail from the Supreme Court in July 2021.

However, after conviction, the court sent her to judicial custody till Tuesday.

Tamhankar and his female colleague were the account executive and account manager at a salon chain in suburban Andheri and reported to Vyas, the finance manager, and were allegedly in an illicit relationship.

Vyas was allegedly killed because she had issued a memo to one of the accused for not working properly. Besides losing their job, the two feared their affair might get exposed.

The victim's body has not been found yet.

The police cracked the case after a DNA test was done on the blood samples found in the car of one of the accused. The vehicle was allegedly used in the crime, they had said.

Vyas went missing on March 16, 2018, and her family scoured CCTV footage from Grant Road and Mumbai Central railway stations to locate her before filing a missing person's complaint at DB Marg police station.

The family had told the police that Vyas used to board the 9.11 am Virar-bound suburban train from Grant Road to the salon in Andheri.

The case was later handed over to the Crime Branch, which made the two arrests. The victim was last seen in the company of the accused.

“This crime is the result of wanton lust, the servility to absolutely unchained carnal desire and slavery to loathsome bestiality of passion which ruled the mindset of the accused to commit a devilish crime,” the prosecution had submitted, in its final arguments.

It said that Tamhankar and the woman were in the midst of a "torrid love affair" and their very object was to ensure that they should not be separated.

The result was that Vyas, fell an unwitting victim to this sinister plot drawn up by the accused persons and she had to pay the price with her own life, the prosecution said, calling the murder “premeditated, well planned and most sinister crime”.

The prosecution said the evidence in the court had established that Vyas was picked up by the accused from her residence around 9 am on March 16, 2018.

Following this event, she has not been seen or contacted by anyone and hence, this is a case of "last seen together", the special public prosecutor Avdhut Chimalkar had submitted.

Further, Chimalkar submitted that merely because the victim's body could not be traced, it cannot be assumed that the prosecution has failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt.

(Except for the headline, this article has not been edited by Republic and is published from a syndicated feed.)