Hyderabad: Andhra Pradesh CM N. Kiran Kumar Reddy on Sunday requested the Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan to constitute a special team under a senior police officer's supervision to speed up the investigation over the mysterious death of software professional Esther Anuhya in Mumbai.
The TCS employee from Machilipatnam in Andhra Pradesh was found dead after she went missing in Mumbai.
The Chief Minister requested his Maharashtra counterpart, over phone Sunday evening, to take all steps to take stringent action in this incident.
Kiran Kumar Reddy also spoke to Anuhya's father Singavarapu Jonathan Surendra Prasad, over phone Sunday morning, and extended heartfelt condolences and sympathies.
In Machilipatnam, Minister for Secondary Education and Excise K. Pardha Saradhi, former deputy Speaker of state Assembly B. Vedyavyas and a number of local Congress leaders visited the bereaved family and expressed their sympathies.
Last rites of Anuhya (23), whose body was found off the Eastern Express Highway in Mumbai on January 16, were performed at Machilipatnam on Saturday after the body was brought from Mumbai where postmortem was conducted.
Employed with a reputed software company in Mumbai, Anuhya went missing from the city on January 4, until her body was discovered in suburban Kanjurmarg.
The doctors, who medically examined her body said, the injuries found on her body and private parts were caused by a blunt object.
The cause of her death and sexual assault, if there was any, however, is being ascertained through chemical analysis being done by forensic experts.
Anuhya had boarded the Vishakapatnam-LTT Express train from Vijayawada on January 4 for Mumbai. She was returning to Mumbai after her Christmas holidays but she did not reach her hostel in suburban Andheri.
Relatives and friends of Anuhya held a protest in Secunderabad on Sunday demanding speedy action.
Meanwhile, a demonstration was held on Sunday in Mumbai under the banner 'Indian Christian Voice' (ICV), demanding 'speedy' probe and arrest of the accused 'within 48 hours'.
Protestors held posters with 'Ab Bas' (Enough is enough), to highlight the alleged apathy towards the case by Mumbai police and the Government Railway Police (GRP) following a complaint by the victim's parents.
"It was the family that frantically searched all over Kanjurmarg and other parts of the city as Anuhya's mobile phone signals were last traced to these areas. It was her family members and friends who discovered a decomposed body that was later identified to be that of Anuhya," ICV president Abraham Mathai said.
Mathai accused Mumbai police and GRP of 'inappropriate' treatment and response when they approached the police. He has threatened to hold protests on a larger scale at South Mumbai's Azad Maidan, if the accused were not tracked down and arrested within 48 hours.
The FIR of Anuhya's missing person complaint was registered at the Kurla Government Railway Police and her body was found in suburban Kanjurmarg area, eleven days after she went missing.
Grieving family members alleged that there was total insensitivity towards their complaints and requests whenever the police was approached.
