Tragic Honor Killing in Maharashtra: Woman Marries Boyfriend's Corpse After Family's Betrayal

Aanchal Mamidwar's father was seen dancing with her and her boyfriend.

Nanded, Maharashtra:

In April, a father was captured dancing alongside his daughter and her boyfriend during celebrations. Nearly seven months later, this same man is now in police custody, charged with murdering his daughter's boyfriend in Maharashtra's Nanded because he opposed their relationship.

His daughter - now tragically known as the woman who married her lover's corpse - has accused her family of deceiving her by pretending "all is well" before they killed her boyfriend, Saksham Tate, on Thursday.

On April 14, Gajanan Balaji Mamidwar, father of Aanchal Mamidwar, was celebrating Ambedkar Jayanti. Footage shows him dancing with his 21-year-old daughter, her 20-year-old boyfriend, and their friends. The couple appeared happy, unaware of what lay ahead. One video frame captured Gajanan lovingly embracing his daughter, who has now disowned her family and chosen to live with her boyfriend's relatives instead.

The video also depicted Saksham Tate's friends carrying the accused on their shoulders.

Ambedkar Jayanti - commemorating Babasaheb Ambedkar's birth anniversary - is celebrated by Dalits, adivasis, and other communities he advocated for. While Tate belonged to the Dalit community, Aanchal Mamidwar was from the Special Backward Class.

Sources indicate that Aanchal's father and brother had plotted to gain the victim's trust before murdering him.

Aanchal's parents and her two brothers have been named as suspects in Saksham Tate's killing. One brother, who shot Tate and crushed his head with a tile, is a juvenile.

Saksham Tate was shot on Thursday evening, with the bullet penetrating his ribs. During the victim's final rites the following day, in a heartbreaking gesture, Aanchal "married" his body. She demanded capital punishment for her father and brothers for killing her boyfriend.

Hours before the murder, Aanchal claimed her younger brother took her to a police station to file a complaint against Tate. When she refused, two police officers allegedly encouraged her brother to kill Tate. "Two police officials provoked him (Himesh), suggesting he should kill the man I love rather than fight with others," she stated.

She recounted how her brother became agitated by this remark and told the officials he would return to the police station after killing Saksham. "Then he killed him," she said.

The couple had been in a relationship for three years, and in an interview with NDTV, the woman claimed her family members regularly socialized with Tate. "They would be nice to him, eat together. They convinced him that all was well. We had no idea something like this would happen," she explained.

She also revealed that her father once told Saksham that to marry her, "he would have to convert to our religion, Hindu Dharma. Saksham was ready to do everything to marry me. But I don't know what happened."

The accused face charges including murder, unlawful assembly, rioting, and other offenses registered under Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, and Arms Act, according to an Itwara police station official.