On January 18, the Bombay High Court commuted the death sentence of serial killer sisters Seema Gavit and Renuka Shinde to a life sentence. The court cited inordinate delay and indifference by the state government in dealing with their mercy petition as the reason for reducing the sentence.
Renuka and Seema have been convicted of kidnapping 13 children and killing five of them between 1990 and 1996. They were sentenced to death in 2001 by the sessions court. The Bombay High Court in 2004 and the Supreme Court in 2006 [Judgement PDF] upheld the decision. Their mercy petition was rejected by the Governor in 2008 and by the President in 2014.
From kidnapping to murder – the horrifying story that shocked the nation
In 2006, after the Supreme Court upheld the death sentence of the two sisters, special public prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam said in a statement, “We limited the period of killing to six years. However, this had been going on for longer than that. The women could not remember how many children they had killed.”
The facts revolving around the case are horrifying and spine-chilling. The two sisters, along with their mother, Anjana Bai, kidnapped at least 13 children and used them in petty crimes and begging. At least five of the kidnapped children were killed as they allegedly refused to co-operate or did not stop crying. The cruel and merciless faces of the two serial killer sisters still haunt those who were involved in the case.
The killer sisters had kidnapped children, mostly toddlers, from Nashik, Satara, Pune, Kolhapur and Sangli.
According to a report in the New Indian Express, Nikam had said they had information that the sisters killed at least 44 children, but they could only pinpoint 12 murders. He said, “Our case was based on circumstantial evidence. It had shocked the conscience of the country.”
How Police come to know about the killings
In October 1996, senior police officer Mandaleshwar Madhavrao Kale was assigned to a case where a nine-year-old girl Kranti Gavit was kidnapped in Nasik. Kale, who had experience of 36 years in the force, did not expect to uncover a series of murders during the investigation. The Mint quoted Kale narrating how Anjana’s ex-husband’s wife filed a case against her, his step-daughter Renuka Shinde and daughter Seema Gavit.
Kale said, “Pratibha Mohan Gavit, wife of a Mohan Gavit, had filed a kidnapping case against her husband’s first wife, Anjana Bai, his step-daughter Renuka Shinde and daughter, Seema Gavit. Pratibha’s older daughter Kranti had been missing, and she was convinced that these three women were responsible.”
Anjana, who was allegedly the mastermind of the racket, was married once before marrying Mohan Gavit. She was a petty thief and had a criminal history. Owning to the repeated questioning by the Police, Gavit left Anjana and the two girls. He then married Pratibha. Mohan and Pratibha had a daughter named Kranti, who was allegedly kidnapped by Anjana.
When Police started an investigation into the disappearance of Kranti Gavit, Anjana, Renuka and Seema went underground. After a few days, they resurfaced and attempted to kidnap Mohan’s younger daughter. However, Nasik police arrested the trio before they could kidnap the girl. During interrogation, Kale said Anjana did not say a word. He said, “She would just sit there and look. Never once did that woman crack.” Among the three, the weakest was the step-daughter Seema who finally admitted to kidnapping and killing Kranti Gavit. However, she claimed to have committed the crime at the behest of her mother.
A special investigating team visited their house in Nasik, where they uncovered evidence of many more kidnappings. They found discarded clothes of the children. Another piece of evidence that they recovered were photographs of the birthday party of Renuka’s children in which non-local children were present. The Police came to know about the petty crimes the women were involved in, but they did not know who the children were.
The incident that triggered the kidnapping of children
During the investigation, the Police found that in 1990, Renuka’s son from the first marriage, Sudhir, was with her at the Chaturshringi temple, Pune, where she was attempting to pickpockets of the devotees. While she was trying to pick someone’s pocket, the person caught her. Using her presence of mind, she used Sudhir to prove her innocence. She gave the argument how a woman with a little child could commit a crime. The crowd believed her and let her go. The incident gave an idea to the trio to always keep a child with them to escape if caught.
Ujjwal Nikam, in a statement, informed that according to the details the Police mentioned in the case files, during one of the theft attempts in Kolhapur, Seema was caught by the crowd. At that time, Anjana Bai deliberately injured a one-year-old child named Santosh, whom the trio had kidnapped, to create a distraction. Nikam said, “Anjana Bai threw the child down with force in order to create a distraction.” The merciless women did not blink an eye before injuring the children who accompanied them during the acts of crime.
The case files further revealed that the majority of kidnappings took place at busy places such as fairgrounds and temple compounds in cities including Pune, Kolhapur and Nasik. While cases were filed in some cases, many kidnappings went unreported as the children belonged to poor families, and Police allegedly did pay heed to the suffering of the families. Nikam said, “It is estimated that the kidnappings might have been more than 40 in number, but we had no evidence to back that claim.” He added, “Maybe, the parents tried to file a complaint and were turned away. Maybe, they were unable to do so. The kidnapping reports did not start coming in till very late.”
The chilling details of crimes
Santosh, the kidnapped child who was used as a distraction, was one of the children the trio killed. He was the son of a beggar woman. After the said incident, Santosh would not stop crying as the trio did not try to provide any medical assistance to him. Frustrated with the non-stop crying, Anjana repeatedly bashed his head against an iron rod till he died. According to an investigating officer, the two sisters witnessed their mother’s crime while munching vada pav.
In the Supreme Court judgement, it was mentioned, “They left the dead body [of Santosh] near the heap of some old rickshaws and came back to Dharamshala. On the next day, the dead body of Santosh was found, and the matter was reported to the Laxmipur police station.”
One of the kidnapped children, seven-month-old baby Swapnil, was dropped by Seema as he was constantly crying, and she “could not deal with it”. Another 2-year-old boy was hanged upside down, and his head was slammed repeatedly against the wall.
Another child was drowned by Renuka and Seema in the bathroom. One of the sisters held his legs to stop him from moving, and the other drowned him.
The prosecution informed the court that the trio killed most of the children only because they “did not stop crying”. They were charged with the murder of five children, three boys and two girls. According to the case files, the post-mortem of the dead bodies revealed the children were thrown downstairs and beaten repeatedly.
Renuka’s second husband’s testimony
One of the important witnesses that provided details of the crime was Kiran Shinde, the second husband of Renuka. He turned approver and provided details of the crimes committed. He also provided details of where the bodies were disposed of. One of the most horrifying details he provided to the Police was the incident when a dead child was stuffed in a gunny bag and kept between the sisters while they enjoyed watching a movie. Before leaving the theatre, they left the dead body in the women’s lavatory.
A person named Saroday, who was associated with the case in the Supreme Court, described the murder in a statement. He said, “They chopped the body of one child and stuffed it into a gunny bag for disposal. The gang carried the bag with them and watched a movie at Alka Talkies in Kolhapur and ate bhel puri while the bag lay between their feet.”
Apex court called the killings ‘acts of depraved mind’
Kiran Shinde was acquitted for his co-operation. Anjana Bai died in 1997 while the case continued in court. During the trial, the two sisters were lodged in the same prison as Fahmida Sayed, one of the 2003 Mumbai blast accused. The sisters had attacked her in the prison as she was provided with hot water when she was ill. The Supreme Court had pointed out the incident during the trial. The apex court said, “The killings demonstrated a ‘depraved mind’ that killed without any compulsion. Prison, it is said, causes even the most hardened nut to crack, pondering over what landed them there. The two sisters are, however, more concerned about why Fahmida gets hot water when ill than the memory of those whose lives they cut short even before they began.”
The serial killer sisters will not be hanged despite the President denying mercy petition because of Maharashtra’s inordinate delay and indifference in dealing with their mercy petition.
