In a shocking revelation, crime branch officers on Friday said that while the DNA report confirmed the torso recovered from the ghat in Chiplun belonged to producer Karankumar Kakkad, the skull recovered from the same area did not match with DNA samples of Kakkad. Vijay Palande, who is facing twin murder charges had led the police to the ghat where he had dumped Kakkad’s body after murdering him.
On April 16, decomposed body parts, suspected to be that of the Kakkad, were found in Kumbharli Ghat at Chiplun, nearly one and a half month after he was allegedly kidnapped by a 25-year-old model-cum actress and her three gangster associates. The four accused — actress Simran Sood, her gangster husband Vijay Palande and two other associates Dhananjay Shinde and Manoj Gajkosh — were later arrested for the murder.
“We got the DNA samples of the torso and skull recovered from the Ghat. The torso matched with the family members of Kakad but not the skull,” said a crime branch official.
“Now it is clear that the skull belonged to some other person. Hence another murder case would be registered against the arrested accused,” the official said. Kakkad (28), who wanted to try his luck in the film industry, was abducted on March 5 allegedly by Sood, Palande, Shinde and Gajkosh.
Initially, a missing person’s case was registered in Amboli police station, following a complaint by Kakkad’s brother Aneesh. However, it was later changed to an abduction case after the arrest of Sood on April 12.