Mother, son host woman at tea shop. Hours later, she is found dead in a field

On August 8, residents of Ramakkapeta village in Telangana’s Siddipet district spot a partially burnt body of an unknown woman in an agricultural field. It was concealed within the dense foliage. Inspecting the scene, police immediately become sure of one thing: The crime was committed somewhere else.

“We recovered a huge bag, which was used to cover the body. This led us to the conclusion that the crime took place elsewhere and the body, carried inside the bag, was dumped in the agricultural field,” Siddipet Commissioner of Police Rashmi Perumal tells The Indian Express.

Even so, an open agricultural field seems like an odd spot to dispose of a body after murder. But first, police have a more pressing task at hand: Identifying the victim. Their search ends in Bhoompally village in the same district, located 100 km north of state capital Hyderabad.

The woman is identified as Athikam Vijaya, 45. “We could identify the body because the face was not burnt beyond recognition,” says Perumal. As police interview residents of Bhoompally – a village of 3,000 where everyone seems to know everyone – in the hope of finding witnesses, they come across C Rajitha, a 38-year-old woman.

Rajitha makes a living running a small tea shop along with her teenaged son near a cluster of small houses for the poor. It is Rajitha who seems to have a clue on what may have led to Vijaya’s fate. She tells the investigating personnel that her neighbour Vijaya had several property disputes in her marital home.

“She was unbelievably calm when questioned at that time,” recalls Perumal. Police begin tracking the whereabouts of Vijaya’s family members. At the same time, they start going through footage from CCTV cameras installed in main entrances and busy public areas of the village.

The police investigators are lucky. These CCTVs have come up only in March, as part of a crime prevention drive by Telangana Police called Siddipet Suraksha Netra. Scanning through the footage, police stumble upon two faces they have only recently got familiar with – Rajitha and her son.

“We found the duo on a bike with a seemingly heavy bag between them. They seemed to be going somewhere,” says Perumal. Tracking their return, police spot another oddity. “While returning, they did not have the bag with them,” Perumal adds.

Police go back to the footage of the bag and notice something eerie. The big bag Rajitha and her son were carrying on the bike has an uncanny resemblance to the bag they spotted on Vijaya’s body. On August 18, the police finally knock at Rajitha's door.

But this time, she is not their star witness, but an accused in the murder case. Rajitha and her husband Dubbaya had a tumultuous family life, police say. He used to be an alcoholic who drew pleasure out of beating up his wife.

After putting up with the abuse for years, one night, some two years ago, Rajitha decided to hit back. She allegedly poured scalding hot water on Dubayya’s feet. The incident left him with 80% burns and a paralysis in the left leg.

Despite the episode, Dubbaya continues to live in the house. Neighbours say Rajitha dotes on her 15-year-old son and would look after him well despite her limited income. Of late, she had started to put special emphasis on his health, a neighbour recalls.

“She had bought him dumbbells and protein powder to build muscle,” says Perumal.