How high electricity bill led to discovery of 6 month old murder in a Madhya Pradesh house

For more than six months, the body of a murdered woman remained in a state of decomposition inside a refrigerator in a rented room in Dewas, Madhya Pradesh, while a family lived just a few feet away, completely unaware of the horror nearby.

According to a TOI report, the house was owned by businessman Dhirendra Shrivastava, who has been living in Dubai for the past six months. The house had a room, kitchen, and toilet on the right side, while the left side contained two bedrooms and a hall. The two sides were connected by a staircase that led to the upper floor, which remained in Shrivastava's possession.

In July 2024, Balveer Rajput, a resident of Ingoria in Ujjain, rented the ground floor. He had repeatedly asked the landlord, who was in Dubai, to unlock another room for his family, which included his wife and two children aged 10 and 11, as the room had been kept locked by the previous tenant. Eventually, the landlord gave permission to unlock the room.


On Thursday, Balveer broke the lock and entered the room, only to find the refrigerator running. Annoyed by the previous tenant’s “carelessness” and suspecting that the fridge was causing his unusually high electricity bills, he switched it off and planned to clear out the rest of the room the following morning.

By Friday morning, the defrosting refrigerator emitted a foul odour, which spread throughout the area. When neighbours alerted the police about the smell, they arrived at the scene, opened the refrigerator, and discovered the decomposed body of Pinky, also known as Pratibha Prajapati. She was wrapped in a bedsheet.

Pinky had been the live-in partner of Sanjay Patidar, the former tenant who had vacated the house in June 2024 but left two rooms locked, claiming he would return to collect his belongings. Among the items left behind was the refrigerator, which concealed the body.

In a TOI report, police stated that Pratibha was killed in March 2024. Patidar had strangled her during an argument about her insistence on marriage, despite knowing he was already married with children. He, along with his friend Vinod Dave, strangled her and stuffed her body into the refrigerator, setting it to its coldest setting before locking the room and fleeing.

Pratibha had been living with Patidar for over five years.

Patidar was arrested hours after the body was found, and police are coordinating with authorities in Rajasthan to question his accomplice, Vinod Dave, who is currently jailed in Tonk for another crime.

Inputs from TOI