On March 20, near the 40-foot bridge on the mountain road from Salem to Yercaud, the forest department received information about a strong stench. When the forest guard Perumal went there, he found a suitcase box lying in a 20-foot hole in the forest area and a foul smell was emanating from it.
He informed Yercaud police station about this. Accordingly, policemen led by Inspector Senthil Rajmohan rushed to the scene. They seized the mysterious suitcase that was swarming with flies and worms. When it was opened, it was found that the corpse of a young woman was inside the box. The murdered woman was wearing Suditaar tops and pants.
Forensic experts rushed to the scene and collected clues. An autopsy was conducted at the Salem Government Hospital. The body was completely decomposed, as the miscreants must have murdered the young woman, stuffed her in a suitcase and dumped her in this area long ago. So it was not immediately possible to identify the dead body.
District Police SP, Arun Kapilan, Salem Suburban DSP informed. Amala Adwin rushes to the event. SB sped up the police to find out the identity of the young woman who was found dead first, as if they knew who the killer was, they could easily get close to the killer. It turned out that there was a sticker from the store that sold the box. When we inquired about it, it was revealed that a young man had bought the box from a shop selling travel goods in Lulu Mall in Coimbatore.
On inquiry based on that, it was revealed that Nataraj (32) from Paravakkottai near Mannarkudi in Tiruvarur district bought the box. Subsequently, the mysterious knots in the case of the murder of the young woman started unraveling one after another. When the police arrested Nataraj and conducted a thorough investigation, shocking information that surpassed the cinema came to light. Nataraj admitted early on that the dead body inside the suitcase was Subalakshmi (33) from Muthulapuram, Theni district, and that he had killed her and packed her in the box and dumped her in the Yercaud Hills.
We inquired from the police about the reason for the murder. Nataraj, who has completed his degree in engineering, was working in France. He also ran a consultancy firm that sent young graduates to work abroad. He is married and his wife and two daughters live in Paravakkottai. A year and a half ago, when he was working in France, he had posted on a matrimony website with a photo that he wanted a woman for his second marriage. Subalakshmi, who was then working in a computer company in Qatar, had also registered her details along with her photo and mobile number on the same matrimony website where Nataraj had registered that she needed a groom for her second marriage and had divorced her husband.
The two met through the matrimony website and developed a friendship by talking daily through cell phones. At some point their friendship crossed the line and turned into an extramarital relationship. After returning to India, the two decided to start a family together. Subsequently, they returned to India in June last year. Both of them went to their home and stayed for a few days, then left home saying that they were going abroad again. But as they had already planned without going abroad, they rented a house in Beelamet, Coimbatore and started a family.
Nataraj, who was in love with Subalakshmi, had her name tattooed on his arm. Meanwhile, Nataraj returned to Coimbatore after seeing his wife and children on 1st January last. Subalakshmi questioned Nataraj on his arrival in Coimbatore about the erasure of the tattoo of his name on his hand. Nataraj said that his wife in Paravacottai had gone to visit the children and thus erased the tattoo. Thus Jan. On the night of the 1st, there was a heated argument and dispute between them.
In a fit of rage, Nataraj grabbed Subalakshmi and smashed her head against the wall. He also hit him on the head with a stick from the house. Subalakshmi collapsed in a pool of blood and died on the spot. Nataraj gets nervous knowing that he is dead. Subsequently, he contacted his relative friend Kanivalavan in Paravakottai and told him about the incident and called him for help.
To avoid getting caught by the police, they decided to hide the woman’s body. They then went to a shop in Luloo Mall in Coimbatore and bought a large trolley suitcase box. They put Subalakshmi’s dead body in that box. Then they hired a car and drove to Yercaud with the box containing the dead body in it. They were driving at night and dumped the suitcase containing the dead body in a dense forest near a 40-foot pedestrian bridge.
After climbing the mountain, they escaped by car overnight through Kuppanur. After two and a half months, there was no news about the incident, Nataraj thought that they would not face any further problems. So he was planning and making arrangements to go back to France to work. In this case, he was caught by the police due to a small trace in the suitcase box.
Meanwhile, since the day of dumping the dead body, Nataraj has not lived in one place but has been changing his residence frequently to Coimbatore, Chennai and Paravakkottai. On March 20, after media reports of the body being seized, he also planned to go to France and go into hiding. The investigation revealed that the arrangements for the same have been made quickly.
They had planned to hide the dead body and went there thinking that it might be dumped in the Elagiri hills of Tirupattur district. It was also revealed during the investigation that they came to Kallakurichi Servarayan Hill area and finally chose Yercaud Hill and dumped the dead body. Subsequently, the police arrested both Nataraj and his friend Kanivalavan and produced them in Yercaud Criminal Justice Court on March 24.
Both were lodged in the Salem Central Jail on a court order. Salem Charaka DIG Uma, District SP Arun Kapilan praised the special forces led by DSP Amala Adwin, Police Inspectors Senthilraj Mohan, Nagaraj, Sriram, who identified the murdered woman and arrested the killers within five days of the recovery of the body.