A district court in Indore has sentenced a man to life imprisonment for suffocating his wife to death and then having a cobra bite her body to make the killing look like a snakebite death. The court also imposed a fine of 45,000 rupees on the convict. Additional Sessions Judge Hemant Kumar Raghuvanshi delivered the verdict on June 24, convicting Amitesh Pateria alias Shalu, 43, under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code for murder, Section 201 for destroying evidence, and Section 51 of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, which deals with killing protected wildlife.
Suffocated with a pillow, then bitten by a cobra to hide the crime
In its order, the court held that the charge against Pateria stood proved beyond reasonable doubt, that he pressed a pillow against his wife Shivani's face and suffocated her to death on December 1, 2019. To destroy evidence of the murder and escape punishment, he then had a cobra bite her body so that investigators and family members would believe she had died from a snakebite. The judge further noted that Pateria killed the cobra he had used to carry out the act once the crime was done.
28 witnesses helped the prosecution prove the case
Additional Public Prosecutor Chandrashekhar Chaudhary said the prosecution produced 28 witnesses in court to establish Pateria's guilt. These included police officers who investigated the case, members of the postmortem board, and a veterinarian, whose testimony helped establish that Shivani's death was caused by suffocation and not by snakebite.
A dead cobra recovered from the scene
Pateria had previously worked as a manager at a private bank. According to the prosecution, when police inspected the scene, they recovered the bed, a pillow cover and other household items, along with a dead cobra. However, the postmortem report on Shivani's body clearly stated that her death was caused by suffocation from her mouth being pressed shut, not by snake venom. That medical finding turned the investigation's direction and pointed it squarely at Pateria.
Cobra bought for 5,000 rupees at a railway station in Alwar
An investigating officer in the case told the court that during questioning, Pateria admitted he had bought the cobra for 5,000 rupees from a snake charmer at the Alwar railway station in Rajasthan. He later used the same snake to bite his wife's body.
Marital tension and family disputes cited as background
Witnesses from Shivani's maternal family told the court about long-standing marital tension and family disputes between the couple. Their testimony also helped the court conclude that Pateria had carried out a premeditated murder and then tried to disguise it as an accident or a death caused by snakebite.
