Pune police say Siya Goyal and Chetan Chaudhary traded 2,004 phone calls over about six months and talked for roughly 238 hours. Then, on June 18, they allegedly pushed her fiancé, Ketan Agarwal, off Lohagad Fort.
Both are in judicial custody. Siya’s parents have been speaking publicly about the case, and neither is defending her without conditions.
Her father, Praveen Goyal, told India Today TV that if she is found guilty she should get the same fate police say Ketan met. “Take her to the same fort and push her off the same place. That is all a father can say,” he said. He added that she could be given the death penalty. He is being treated at a Pune hospital after a heart attack, and says the shock of her arrest put him in intensive care.
Yet he does not accept the charge. “I still find it impossible to believe my daughter could do something like this. She never lied to me and always followed the right path,” he said.
Her mother, Pooja Goyal, took a similar line in comments to Newsdotz reported by Mint. “Hang her if she is guilty; a mother is saying this,” she said.
What police say
Superintendent of Police Sandip Singh Gill of Pune (Rural) said some of the calls between the two lasted two to three hours. On the day of the killing, he said, they met at a cafe and picked a spot on the fort from which Ketan could be pushed into the valley. Police say they saw him as an obstacle and decided to remove him rather than end the engagement and face the family’s reputation. Investigators also cite CCTV footage from the fort.
Police describe earlier attempts. They say Siya took Ketan to Lohagad on May 31 and pressed him to go again on June 4, though his mother would not let him. On June 14, police allege, she tried to push him off a cliff and he caught hold of a bush. When he asked why, she raised a false alarm about a snake.
Another episode involves a passport. Police say Siya took Ketan’s from the car at a food mall at Khalapur on June 6, on the way to Mumbai airport for a Bali pre-wedding photoshoot, and dumped it in the women’s washroom. Inspector Dinesh Tayde said a team would be sent to the mall to look for it.
The couple got engaged in February. A palace in Udaipur had been booked for a November wedding.
The family’s account
Pooja Goyal said she saw no sign of trouble. “They used to video call each other, meet regularly and appeared happy together. Ketan even came home for dinner,” she told India Today TV. She said the family had spent nearly Rs 50,000 shopping for the Bali trip, and asked why they would do that if Siya had said she did not want the marriage.
The Goyals also deny a claim by Ketan’s father that they hid facts from his family. Praveen said they knew nothing of trouble between the two, or of an affair with a third person. He called Siya a “simple girl” who seemed happy about the wedding. Siya’s brother is staying at the hospital with their parents, according to an NDTV report cited by Mint, and the family home in Market Yard is locked.
Sources
- Hang her, push her off the same fort if she’s guilty: Siya Goyal’s parents
- ‘Hang her’ — Siya Goyal's mother says she should get ‘strictest punishment’ if found guilty in Pune murder case | Today News
