When Vijay Singh, a 42-year-old additional sessions judge, was brutally murdered with a sharp-edged weapon at Patiala on the night of October 13, it sent a shock wave across Punjab. For, the sensational incident had occurred at the Polo Ground in a high-security zone and at a stone's throw from Chief Minister Amarinder Singh's residence, Moti Bagh Palace.

The bigger shock, however, came four days later when the Patiala Police arrested gynaecologist Ravdeep Kaur. According to the police, Kaur, 41, confessed having paid Rs 5 lakh to granthi Manjit Singh to eliminate the judge who had had a relationship with her for a long time but had rejected her persistent pleas for marriage.

On the face of it, the murder was a crime of passion that exposed the dark underbelly of high society in conservative Patiala. Both the judge and the doctor are from well-to-do and politically influential families. While Vijay was the son of Amarjit Singh Walia, one-time confidant of the late President Giani Zail Singh and former chairman of the Punjab Public Service Commission, Kaur is the only daughter of retired district revenue officer D.S. Bahia. Both the families had known each other for long.

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The genesis of the crime, according to the police, lies in the extramarital relationship between Kaur and Vijay. Kaur, who runs a private maternity hospital, separated from her husband R.S. Mann, also a doctor, two years ago and had been living with her 14-year-old son. Vijay, father of three girls, continued his flirtation with Kaur but didn't marry her.

Passion gave way to a sense of revenge. Four months ago when Kaur met 24-year-old Manjit, she had made up her mind to eliminate the judge, say her interrogators. She enticed Manjit by helping him financially and promising to marry him and migrate to Canada, provided he avenged her "suffering" inflicted by the judge. Kaur set up the murder plot with a supari of Rs 5 lakh. Of this Rs 50,000 was paid in advance. Manjit thought he had struck gold.

On October 13, Vijay went out for a walk after dinner as was his habit. Only this time he was alone. At around 10.30 p.m. when the judge was talking on his mobile to a friend in Germany, Manjit, an expert in the martial art of gatka, struck from behind with a sword, breaking Vijay's skull with the first blow. Manjit inflicted 26 blows till he was sure the judge was dead. Then he went to Kaur's residence, collected the remaining Rs 4.5 lakh, threw the sword in a canal and left for a pilgrimage to Amritsar and Anandpur Sahib. The police got to know of the crime when the judge's friend in Germany, who had heard his shrieks on mobile, informed the family.

Initially, it looked like a case of blind murder. But it didn't take long for the special investigative team (sit), set up on the chief minister's instructions, to zero in on the suspect. Kaur proved to be a tough nut to crack. "She eventually broke down when we played on her emotions," says an sit officer who interrogated her for two days. Kaur's father, who was not on talking terms with her since her break-up with her husband, was also roped in to play on her sense of betrayal during the interrogation. Once she spilled the beans, the police nabbed Manjit and recovered the weapon and cash, solving the case within four days of the murder.

No lawyer came to Kaur's defence but she is hardly remorseful. "Vijay had ruined my life and I am one of his victims," she reportedly told the police. "She still thinks she had only righted the wrong inflicted on her by the judge," says Amardeep Singh Rai, senior superintendent of police, Patiala. Social circles in Patiala and elsewhere in Punjab are abuzz with the tale of the brutal revenge.

While Rajesh Gill, sociologist at the Panjab University, blames it on the breakdown of family support system, police officers see it as a fallout of the attitude of the new rich generation who think they can get away with anything. Clearly, it is a pointer to a deeper malaise in society.

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