UP serial killer nabbed, admits to killing six women

Lucknow: The serial killer, who had allegedly killed nine women in the past few months in Uttar Pradesh’s Bareilly district triggering panic among the people, was on Friday nabbed by the cops.

According to the police sources, the serial killer, identified as Kuldeep Gangwar, a resident of Nawabganj area in the district, was arrested after preliminary investigation by the police.

Police officials in Bareilly said that Kuldeep had admitted to six women in the past nine months. ‘’Kuldeep had some family problems.... his wife had left him soon after marriage as his behaviour was not good,’ said a senior police official.

‘’Kuldeep appears to be suffering from some complex.... he has a disliking for women...he was upset after his wife left him,’’ the official said.

The officials said that Kuldeep was taken to the spots from where the police had recovered bodies of the women. ‘’He is being quizzed and we expect to have more information regarding the killings after his interrogation is over,’ he added.

Sources said that the accused used to confront women in the rural areas, asked them to have physical relations with him and killed them when they protested.

Bareilly police chief Anurag Arya told reporters that a war room had been set to nab the serial killer and the operation was named ‘’operation Talash’’.

As many as 22 teams had been formed and footage of 1500 CCTVs were examined, he said. Policemen, dressed as farmers, were deployed in the areas where the killings had taken place.

The district police had on Thursday released three sketches, which they had prepared based on information received from the people and appealed to the people to immediately contact the cops if they saw anyone having similarity with the sketches.

The killings had a similar pattern The women were targeted while they were on their way back home after working in the fields in the evening and all of them were between 45 and 65 years of age. All of them were strangulated with a saree or chunri (scarf) and their bodies were dumped in the nearby fields.