Swathi’s death sparked doubt

up with a suspicious video in which Swathi talked about harassment. In the video, which was shot before her death, it looks like Swathi was being compelled to testify against Naresh’s family,” said a police source.

Naresh’s father Venkataiah said that soon after their marriage on March 25 in Mumbai, Swathi had gone to Antop Hill police station and had lodged a complaint with the Station House Officer seeking protection. She feared a threat to her life from her father who was not ready to accept her marriage to a low caste man.

“Reddy was a rich man with a lot of property and an influential person as a former mandal president of TD. Many villagers think that he had already decided to kill both Naresh and Swathi when he heard about their marriage,” said one of Reddy’s neighbours from Lingarajpalli village.

Naresh fell in love with Swathi from the Reddy community while they were studying at a college at Valigonda in Nalgonda district. As she belonged to a upper caste her father did not accept the relationship. They eloped to Mumbai and got married there. West Zone Task Force police arrested a notorious burglar and his aide on Friday. Police officials seized 31 tolas of gold ornaments and `2.5 lakh from them.

The accused, Ratlavath Shanker Naik alias Rajesh Reddy, 24, a resident of Thumkunta village, was earlier involved in theft cases registered in Mahbubnagar, Raidurgam, Langer Houz, Osmania University and Kushaiguda police stations.

“A jail warden of Cherlapally Central Jail, Kurma Sateesh, received the stolen property, weighing around 10 tolas, from Shanker after he melted it,” said West Zone deputy commissioner of police A. Venkateshwar Rao.

“According to their confession we recovered stolen goods worth `2 lakh from them,” added the deputy commissioner of police.

On Friday, Langer Houz police arrested Ratlavath Shanker Naik as he was riding on a stolen bike near NTR statue in Langer Houz carrying stolen gold ornaments.