Colaba death: Family yet to come to terms

A fortnight after a three-year-old girl, Shanaya Hathiramani, died when her father’s friend allegedly threw her out of a window, her family is yet to come to terms. Anil Chugani (43) hurled Shanaya from his 7th-floor flat on September 7.

“Since Shanaya’s death, her twin sister asks about her. We are yet to come out of it. Since, we had twin girls, we used to buy a pair of everything for them and we are still doing it,” said Lal Hathiramani, her grandfather.

“Six months ago, Chugani returned from Morocco. He was looking for a job. He claimed he was lonely and visited our house almost every day. We never doubted him,” he added.

On September 7, Chugani, a friend of Shanaya’s father, took the twin sisters to his home in Ashoka Apartment, opposite their building. The deceased’s mother sent their six-year-old brother along with the maid as well. Chugani took Shanaya to the flat on the pretext of washing her hands and flung her from the window. The child fell on a car parked there. Immediately after the incident Shanaya was rushed to the hospital, but she succumbed.

After the incident, Chugani reported the incident to the police, who arrested him for the murder. During the course of interrogation, it was revealed Chugani was looking for an opportunity to kill the girl. Chugani revealed that his woman colleague from Morocco had told him that someone had performed a black magic on him due to which he is facing health issues.

To rid himself and his family of the curse, he had to offer a sacrifice of the twins. Police found a diary from him in which he had mentioned about the curse.

After the revelation, the Colaba police booked him under relevant sections of the Maharashtra Prevention and Eradication of Human Sacrifice and Other Inhuman Evil and Aghori Practices and the Black Magic Act. In his diary, Chukani had also called the girls as mosquitoes and wrote, “mosquitoes are troubling him, kill them.”