Calcutta, June 5: A young homemaker who had threatened to drag to court a promoter who had been denying her possession of a one-room flat she had booked in Tiljala was today found dead in a canal off EM Bypass.

Police located the decomposed body of Huma Nasir, 24, following an alleged murder confession by the promoter who had been arrested after the woman went missing on June 1.

She had gone to Sheikh Hannan’s office that day after being promised the keys of the 175sqft flat on the top floor of a new apartment building on GJ Khan Road.

On May 31, Huma had cajoled two other women, who were also being denied possession of their flats, to accompany her to a lawyer in Alipore court. “But Hannan had got wind of her move and called her thrice that day,” said Huma’s mother. “In the last call, he told her to meet him the next morning with all the papers so that the flat could be handed over.”

Huma went to the promoter on June 1 telling her bookbinder husband she would go straight to the lawyer if the man played up again.

When she remained unreachable over the phone till late that evening, relatives lodged a diary at the Tiljala police station accusing Hannan of abducting her.

Two days later, the police picked up Hannan and four of his associates. “Hannan has said he killed Huma with help from three others — Salauddin, Sabir and Nanna. The body was put in a gunny bag and taken to Bhojerkhal in a Maruti van that was driven by Ansar, the fifth associate, and dumped there,” said a police officer working on the case. Her feet and hands were tied.

Police said the couple had booked the flat for Rs 75,000 and paid Rs 60,000. They had wanted to move in and finish the construction themselves as the promoter had left the floor, the bathrooms and some other jobs unfinished.

Many young couples in the city suffer the sort of harassment Huma and her husband had faced to get the flat. The police are often accused of siding with promoters who flout norms and take customers for a ride.

One of Huma’s relatives accused Tiljala police station of refusing to accept their complaint on June 1. “It was registered after we got the help of some local politicians.”

Huma’s husband, Abdul Babloo, said he went to Tiljala on the evening of June 1 after he failed to get in touch with his wife over the phone. “Local people said they had heard a woman scream inside a flat on the second floor of an under-construction building on GJ Khan Road,” he added.

Babloo and his wife used to live in a rented flat in Topsia. They had shifted to her parents’ house near Rajabazar with their own apartment nearing completion.

Neighbours there described Huma, who had studied till Class XII, as a feisty woman who would never give up easily. She leaves behind a one-year-old son.