The software engineer went missing after arriving in the city from her hometown in Andhra Pradesh after Christmas vacation. Her partly-decomposed body was found in the mangroves near Kanjurmarg on January 16. It is suspected she was sexually assaulted before being killed, but her phone and ring were with her.
CCTV footage from the station shows an unidentified thick-set man in white shirt and blue jeans carrying her luggage. Esther is walking alongside, glued to a cell phone. The man appears to have come to pick her up and may even have been acquainted with Esther. So far, the police had focused their probe on auto and taxi drivers operating outside LTT.
Apart from the man's identity, another riddle for the cops is that of the mobile phone seen in the footage. Esther's personal phone, found near her body, had a dual SIM and no calls were made from either of her numbers after her train crossed the Maharashtra border. The possibilities that the cops are now probing is that either Esther had an additional phone which her family wasn't aware of or that the phone belonged to the man carrying her luggage.
A police and GRP team met Esther's family in Hyderabad with the CCTV footage in a bid to identify him. They apparently said he wasn't related to them.
"Anuhya's father S J S Prasad had instructed her to stay till sunrise (at the station) and we can't understand why she ventured out. From the CCTV footage it appears that Anuhya is walking out with the man. We still don't know who he is and whether he is receiving her or lured her with promises of a lift," said a senior police officer, adding that a clearer picture will emerge by late night.
Esther's train had reached LTT at 4.55am on January 5. The spot where she alighted on platform 3 isn't covered by CCTVs. "We started checking footage from other cameras at the terminus. Then we spotted Esther walking into a waiting hall in the old terminus. She did not stay in the waiting hall for long and walked out within minutes. Around 5.10am, we spotted her again in the CCTV grabs of platforms 4-5. This time, she was following the man who was carrying her luggage and seemed at ease. Why she ventured to platforms 4-5 when her train did not arrive there needs to be found out," said a senior official.
The police have contacted TCS, where Esther worked, to inquire if the unidentified person works there or whether the company had sent someone to pick her up. The cops have also contacted her friends. "Our priority is to find out the phone number that she is seen using at the station. We have contacted mobile service providers. Data has been wiped out from her personal handset found near her body and we are trying to get it recovered through experts," said an official.
Cops have also made inquiries at Thiruvananthpuram where Esther had undergone training between July and September last year.
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