Vikas Walkar, father of murder victim Shraddha Walkar, dies of heart attack in Mumbai

Vikas Walkar, the father of Shraddha Walkar

Vikas Walkar, the father of Shraddha Walkar who was brutally killed by her boyfriend in 2022, passed away at his residence in Vasai, a suburb near Mumbai, police said.

According to initial reports citing sources close to the family said that Vikas Walkar's death was caused by a heart attack. Vikas Walkar was struggling with emotional trauma after the horrific murder of his daughter.

Vikas Walkar was found motionless by his family members in the morning, following which he was rushed to a nearby hospital where doctors declared him dead, a police official said as reported by news agency PTI. The preliminary investigation suggests cardiac arrest caused the death. A postmortem report is awaited in the case, the official said without elaborating.

Shraddha Walkar was allegedly murdered by Aftab in the Mehrauli area on May 18, 2022. Her body parts were thrown into the jungle of the Chhatarpur Pahadi area in the national capital and was arrested in November 2022.

The 28-year-old, who dismembered Shraddha's body and stored the chopped body parts in a refrigerator before disposing of them in the forests of south Delhi's Chhatarpur, is currently in Judicial custody. Aaftab is accused of strangling to death his live-in partner Shraddha and chopping her body into 35 pieces. He is also alleged to have preserved the chopped body parts in a refrigerator before dumping them in forested areas in Delhi and Gurugram.

Earlier, seeking a probe against the family members and relatives of the accused, Shraddha's father also demanded that Aaftab be hanged till death. "I expect a similar lesson for Aaftab Poonwala in the way he murdered my daughter. He should be hanged. A probe should be conducted against Aftab's family members, relatives and all others included in the incident," he said in 2022.

Police had earlier said Aaftab, who confessed to killing Shraddha and chopping her body into 35 pieces, was giving misleading answers to questions.

*With Agency Inputs