Cops grill 22 party guests over death

MUMBAI: The Aarey police has questioned 22 persons, between the ages of 18 to 23 to establish the sequence of events that led to EOW officer Narendra Shinde’s 20-year-old son Atharva’s death under suspicious circumstances after he left home to attend a birthday bash on Monday. The police also acquired the CCTV footage from a nearby bungalow, where the party took place, and has interrogated the villa’s owner, who had rented out the premises. The owner revealed to the police that the party hit a rough patch at least four times during when fighting broke out among the guests.

Sources confirmed that a day after Atharva’ss body was found near the lake, the police have detained 22 people who attended the party on Monday evening. Police said that Atharva’s body was found a few hundred meters away from the party venue. As per the CCTV footage procured from the area, the victim was seen leaving the venue alone. The police are also scanning the call detail records of all the persons, including the victim to confirm if there are any discrepancies in the locations.

Vijaylakshmi Hiremath, senior police inspector of Aarey police said, “We strongly suspect that the cause of death is a result of a fight that ensued between the party guests. The owner of the villa is also being questioned.”

Atharva, a student of a Pune-based college where he was studying sound engineering, had come to the city to attend a friend’s birthday party. He left his Thakur Complex residence on Monday afternoon for the party venue at Royal Palms in Aarey Colony. On Monday night, Atharva had messaged his father saying that he would return home the next morning as it was very late. When Atharva did not come home on Tuesday morning, his family began searching for him and found his body near a lake on Wednesday morning.