Rourkela: The body of a 47-year-old woman was found in Sector-6 on Friday morning.

The deceased Sujata Mohapatra's scooter was also found near the body that lay near Jagannath Leprosy Colony and Tara Tarini slum. Sujata worked as an LIC agent.

Police have found signs of protest and dragging near the scooter. Besides, bloodstains were found near the scooter. The body bore severe stabbing marks on the neck, head, stomach, chest and also on the right hand.

A policeman, who was at the spot, said: "The patrol vehicle, which passed this site had found the scooter parked there."

The patrol party thought since there were two slums nearby, it might belong to someone living there and did not inquire much about it.

The deceased, who was unmarried, stayed with her ageing parents at Koelnagar A block. She was the youngest of her three sisters. While her elder sister is married, the second sister is a widow. Her brother and sister-in-law work in Bangalore. Her father is a retired executive from Rourkela Steel Plant.

The father, D. Mohapatra, said the family did not have any financial problems. He said he did not know anything about her private life.

The bereaved father, who recently had an eye operation and is a cardiac patient, said: "She had no problems that I knew of and she had not behaved in any abnormal way in the past few days."

Sujata's colleagues said she was a workaholic.

"Yesterday, only she had deposited due amounts at the office and behaved perfectly normally," said one of her colleagues in the agency, who did not want to be named.

Inspector in charge of Sector-7 police station Suryanarayna Das said: "We are at the preliminary stage of the investigation and so far there is no lead in the case."

However, he confirmed that the woman had fought with her assailants before she was killed.