Berhampur: A sensational murder case of 1937, which could have remained buried for want of evidence but was ultimately cracked by a British judge, has now become a subject for law students the world over.
“Justice Atkin displayed enough judicial prudence and sent a man and his kin behind the bars on the basis of circumstantial evidence and the statements of two persons as there was no eyewitness to the case,” said Pitabas Panda, secretary of Ganjam Bar Association.
Two years after the murder, the proverbial long arm of the law caught up with Pakala Narayan Swami, a respected resident of this town, his wife and brother-in-law. The trio was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Nakarajau, a moneylender of Srikakulam. After killing Nakaraju, Swami and his kin had chopped the body into seven pieces.
The table on which the body was chopped is now at the Ganjam Bar as the latter is planning to preserve it in a museum. The then members of the Bar had brought the table with permission from the judge to preserve it as a token of remembrance, Panda said.
According to the case diary, a patrol party of police stumbled upon a trunk lying abandoned at Puri railway station in 1937. The mutilated body of a man was discovered in the trunk. Inside the trunk, were written the words Victoria Market, Berhampur.
Police rushed to Berhampur and inquired about the buyer of the trunk from shops in Victoria Market. During inquiry, a trader admitted to have sold the trunk to Narayan Swami.
The police also came to know that a person carried the trunk to the railway station to transport it elsewhere by train. Police arrested Narayan Swami, his wife and brother-in-law and produced them in court. However, the Chhatrapur court refused to admit the case for hearing as there were no witnesses to the incident and acquitted all the accused January 19, 1939 for want of evidence.
Elated by his acquittal, Narayan Swami threw a party at a hotel (present day Maurya Hotel) near his house and celebrated the occasion with display of fireworks. While celebrations were going on, justice Atkin passed by the way in a tonga. He stopped near the hotel and came to know about the celebrations from a local.
Sensing foul play, he sought the case diary from the Chhatrapur court and personally conducted a probe by visiting the murder site.
He examined the table and knives used in the killing and personally talked to the trunk shop owner, the tonga owner who stuffed the chopped body parts inside the trunk and dispatched it in a train to Puri. During interrogation by justice Atkin, Narayan Swami and the co-accused confessed to have killed Nakaraju. The reason – Nakaraju wanted repayment of Rs 3,000 which Narayan Swami’s wife had borrowed from the former.
As per a scheme, the trio sent a letter to Nakaraju in March 1937 inviting him to their house for the money. He was hacked to death on the table and later his body was chopped into six pieces. Atkin also seized the letter from Narayan Swami. The judge handed down life imprisonment to the three and sent them to ‘Kalapani’ in Andaman and Nicobar Islands in 1939. PNN
