June 15: The missing wife of a BJP MLA from Karnataka was found dead in a south-west Delhi flat today.

A joint team of Karnataka and Delhi police broke into the apartment in Dwarka’s Sector 10 to see Padmapriya, 33, hanging from the ceiling. The television was on and was tuned in to a Kannada news channel.

“It looks like suicide, but we are not ruling out anything,” a police officer said.

Padmapriya had gone missing on the morning of June 10 while she was on her way to visit her parents in Mulki, 29km north of Mangalore. Her car was found abandoned near Kunjargiri, about 12km from her Udupi home, on June 13.

Husband Raghupathi Bhat, elected Udupi MLA for the second time, claims he did not know she was missing till the police found the car, which had bloodstains, broken bangles, Rs 10,000 in cash, four credit cards and her mobile phone without the SIM card. The car keys were on the dashboard.

“My wife would call me every day. As I already knew the landline in my in-laws’ house was dead, I did not realise that she had not reached her mother’s house. Only on the third day, after I got no response from her mobile, I got worried. The same day police contacted me,” Bhat said.

The distance between Udupi, 375km from Bangalore, and Mulki is 32km.

Three persons were detained for interrogation in Karnataka yesterday. Atul Kumar, an architect who had decorated the MLA’s house and was close to Padmapriya, was one of them. Police sources said he had led them to the apartment in Dwarka. The flat is owned by Tanvir Singh of Preetampura in north Delhi, who had rented it out.

“Preliminary investigations reveal that Padmapriya seems to have committed suicide because of depression,” a senior police official said.

Amid rumours that the marriage was on the rocks, Bhat told reporters that he and his wife shared a good relationship. The couple have two sons, aged 6 and 10.

But sources in the BJP said the couple had a strained relationship and were on the verge of separation. “He had pleaded with her to wait till elections were over,” a source said.

Karnataka home minister V.S. Acharya had told a newspaper last evening that police had got definite clues about her whereabouts and the case appeared to be a “half-kidnap”.

The state police, who had formed five teams to search for the wife of the ruling party MLA, also said late last night that Padmapriya had been traced. “She is in safe custody and will reach home on Sunday,” a police official said.

Atul, who is believed to have contributed funds to Bhat’s election campaign, was detained on the suspicion that he had helped her flee, sources said.

Acharya and Bhat left for Delhi today. The body has been shifted to hospital.