Australian police announce $1 million reward for information about 2015 murder of Bengaluru techie Prabha Arun Kumar

Prabha Arun Kumar, hailing from Bengaluru and working in Sydney, was stabbed to death in 2015 and the case has not been cracked till date 

The New South Wales (NSW) police have announced a $1 million reward for any information regarding the 2015 murder of Prabha Arun Kumar, a techie from Bengaluru, Australian media reported on Monday. The police have also said that the murder is now believed to be a “targeted attack” and the victim’s husband is a “person of interest”, “but not the only one being probed”, according to the media reports.

Ms. Prabha, 41, was stabbed to death by an unidentified assailant while she was walking home from work through Parramatta Park in Western Sydney at around 9.30 p.m. on March 7, 2015. She was speaking to her Bengaluru-based husband Arun Kumar when the attack occurred.

The NSW police had formed Strike Force Marcoala to probe the case and had appealed for public information multiple times, but the case remained unsolved. 

The latest appeal for information was made by Detective Superintendent Danny Doherty, Commander, Homicide Squad, NSW police force, addressing a press conference at the Prabha Memorial Walk in Parramatta Park on Monday, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). 

Ruling out the initial assessment that it could have been a random attack, Mr. Doherty said: “it is now believed the murder was a targeted attack”. He added that “robbery or sexual assault can be ruled out as a motive,” according to ABC. 

“At the time of her murder, Ms. [Prabha] Kumar’s husband was documented as having another girlfriend and the police today said he remains a person of interest — but he is not the only person being investigated,” ABC reported Mr. Doherty as saying. 

“We are not excluding other people as persons of interest and obviously there is someone out there who committed the murder…who actually stabbed Ms. Prabha to death,” he is reported to have told presspersons. 

Mr. Arun Kumar was earlier questioned by the Australian authorities and he maintained he was innocent.

Published - October 29, 2024 07:00 am IST