Motive unclear in former hockey player’s death, wife claims that he stabbed himself
The Malad police are yet to find out the reason behind the murder of former hockey player Appayya Chenanda (57), who was stabbed multiple times by his wife Amita (47) on Saturday afternoon.
The police said that Amita is still hospitalised as she also got injured during the scuffle between the duo at their flat on the 27th floor of an elite apartment in Malad (west).
“Amita is admitted to Shatabdi hospital and will be arrested after she is discharged from the hospital. The motive behind the murder is still not known,” said the senior inspector of Malad police station Sudhir Mahadik.
The Free Press Journal came to know that after the incident the accused Amita called the society office and said that her husband has tried to kill her. Amita has told neighbours that Chenanda stabbed himself to death after he failed to kill her.
The neighbours complained that no security guards of Dhruv Park of the Agarwal Trinity Tower came to help to take the Chenanda to hospital on time.
“My domestic help heard commotion at around 1:15pm. He first went to one floor down to 25th floor and he realised that the commotion is coming from 27th floor. After he reached 27th floor, my domestic help saw Amita lying in the lobby. She told my domestic help to take her to the flat,” said TV actress Aashka Goradia, who resides on the 26th floor of the apartment.
Amita is the second wife of Chenanda. The complainant, Ganpati, in the case is deceased’s son from his first wife whom he divorced around two decades ago and married Amita, with whom he has one 15year-old daughter.
“Ganpati is the best friend of my brother. The motive behind this murder is still not known. Ganpati has said that there was massive fight between Chenanda and Amita a year ago but it was resolved,” said Goradia.
She has accused the security guards of the apartment of being careless.
“After taking Amita to her door, the domestic help went downstairs to inform the guards but none of them came for the assistance,” said Goradia.
Meanwhile, the domestic help informed Goradia about the matter and she immediately called Rekha, who resides on the same floor where Chenanda was stabbed to death.
Rekha went to Chenanda’s flat where she found him lying on the pool of blood on the bed and Amita was lying down in the living room.
“Amita told me that Chenanda stabbed her. She also asked me to get her a piece of paper to write her will. She took almost 15 minutes to write it on the piece of paper,” said Rekha.
Another neighbour, who is working in a merchant navy, said that they kept calling police emergency number but no one responded for 15 minutes. “I kept dialling 100 several times. Eventually my call to police control room was rreceived and I briefed the matter to the police on phone,” said the neighbour, who further added that he also called a few private doctors of the area to come and treat Chenanda but no private doctors came fearing a serious police case.