Missing Odisha woman constable found murdered; police husband held

Bhubaneswar: The body of a 25-year-old traffic police constable, who had gone missing on September 6, was found buried in a jungle in Odisha’s Keonjhar district, and the police arrested her husband, who is also a constable, for murdering her, a senior officer said on Wednesday.

Deceased Subhamitra Sahoo, a native of Paradip in Jagatsinghpur district and posted in Bhubaneswar, disappeared after leaving home for duty on September 6, police said. Sahoo’s mother lodged a missing person’s report at the Capital police station here the next day.

On the basis of the complaint, the police registered a case and launched an investigation.

During the probe, the police found that Sahoo had secretly solemnised a court marriage with a man named Deepak Rout in July 2024, Bhubaneswar-Cuttack Police Commissioner S Dev Datta Singh said. Rout, also a police constable, became the prime suspect as Sahoo was last seen with him in Bhubaneswar, Singh said.

The husband was picked up and during interrogation, he admitted that he picked up Sahoo from her workplace in his car on September 6 and strangulated her to death between 2 and 3 PM here, the police commissioner said.

He later buried her body in a jungle in Ghatagaon area in Keonjhar district, around 170 km from Bhubaneswar, Singh said. Rout killed Sahoo probably because of financial disputes between them, he stated. Singh said Rout had reportedly taken around Rs 10 lakh from Sahoo and she had been demanding the money back to organise a social ceremony to formally announce their marriage, the commissioner added.