A DAY after Tardeo police arrested 37-year-old man for allegedly murdering and robbing a 70-year-old woman, the investigators on Thursday arrested two more persons in the case. The police said that the two arrested men identified as Surendra Singh (35) and Rajaram Meghwal (31) had committed the crime with the help of their third accomplice, who is still on a run.

The police said Sumeet Tatwal, who is also a distant relative of the senior citizen couple, got employed at their Kalbadevi shop in March and after working for some time initially, he assumed that they have expensive ornaments and cash at their Tardeo home.

A senior police officer said, “Tatwal is from Madhopur while Singh’s wife is also from there. So that’s how they knew each other and soon after he learnt that the senior citizens stay alone in Tardeo, he informed him about it after which he roped in Meghwal and his third accomplice and accordingly hatched a plan to commit a crime.”

The police said the trio even came to Tardeo to do a recce in the following months.

On August 8, the trio left from their respective districts in Rajasthan and after spending a couple of days on the outskirts of Mumbai, they checked in to a hotel near Dhobi Talao in south Mumbai on August 11.The investigators added that on August 12, the three accused had gone to Yusuf Manzil in Tardeo to commit the crime. However, as the 75-year-old Madan Agarwal had already stepped outside and locked the door, they decided to postpone it.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Akbar Pathan (zone III) said, “The three accused went there a little early on August 13 and as soon as Agarwal opened the door to go for a morning walk, they pushed him inside and tied his hands and legs. They even stuffed their mouths before taping it.” They even went to the bedroom and did the same thing with Surekha. However, she died due to suffocation.

The police followed the suspects through the CCTV footage through which they came to know that they were in Pune.

“A team was subsequently sent to Pune and after searching at bus depots, we came to know Singh had gotten off from one of the buses in Ujjain,” said an officer adding, “Later we got information about him, his native place and also that he runs an eatery shop at Jhalawar.”