Pune Police Rely On Gait Analysis To Link Co-Accused To Lohagad Fort Crime Scene

Mumbai: The Maharashtra Police are using gait analysis to prove the involvement of Siya Goyal and her alleged lover and co-accused Chetan Chaudhary in the alleged murder of 26-year-old Pune realtor Ketan Agarwal.

Three days after conducting a crime scene reconstruction with Siya Goyal (20), the Pune Rural Police recreated the sequence of events at Lohagad Fort with her alleged lover and co-accused Chetan Chaudhary (22).

The exercise was aimed at verifying the sighting through forensic gait-matching, which refers to the study of human movement during walking or running, mostly used by police for suspects captured on videos or CCTVs.

Gait analysis is a forensic technique used to identify suspects by analysing the way they walk, especially when they cover their faces with a mask, hoodie or helmet to evade facial recognition. Pune Rural Police will analyse Chetan’s gait and use the reconstructed video to compare with the CCTV footage from the fort.

Chetan’s CCTV footage from the fort showed him wearing a hoodie, with his face concealed behind sunglasses and a mask.

A Pune Rural police official said that police took Chaudhary to Lohagad Fort to reconstruct the crime scene as part of the investigation. He was dressed in a black, striped T-shirt and white pants during this process.

Officials said the crime scene recreation was conducted using a specially prepared dummy that matched Agarwal’s weight. The dummy was used to recreate the incident as accurately as possible and help investigators understand how the events unfolded.

According to police, it was found during the hearing that Chaudhary had climbed the fort in a hoodie but later removed it and remained in a black T-shirt. “While leaving, he put on the hoodie again,” the investigators added, pointing out that by doing so Chetan believed he would avoid attention. Police said the 22-year-old then returned to Pune on the same scooter.

Additional Superintendent of Police, Pune Rural, Shubham Kumar, said Chaudhary was taken to the fort and asked to explain the sequence of events.

“We took Chetan Chaudhary for the scene reconstruction, and he described the sequence of events of that day. The investigation is still underway. The dummy used during the exercise was designed according to Ketan’s weight,” Kumar said.

Agarwal was allegedly pushed to death from a cliff at the Lohagad Fort in Pune district on June 18 by Goyal and Chaudhary (22). Agarwal and Goyal were set to marry in November this year. Goyal and Chaudhary were arrested and have been remanded in police custody till July 3.