The test identification parade for the mother and daughter who were caught carrying a body in a trolley bag at the Ahiritola Ghat last week was conducted in the jail on Saturday.
Police on Sunday submitted a prayer before the Barasat court to take the duo in their custody to question them and find more details about the motive and the murder weapon.
Arati Ghosh and her daughter Falguni were caught carrying a relative’s body in a blue trolley bag and trying to dispose of it at the Ahiritola Ghat on February 25. People in the area got suspicious as the two women were finding it difficult to drag the bag, which also had patches of what looked like blood stains on it.
On opening the bag, a woman’s body was found.
The two women were detained and then arrested and sent to judicial remand.
The test identification parade, which can only be done when an accused is in jail, was conducted on Saturday, the police said.
“The next step is to take the women in police remand. We need to interrogate them to understand the motive and to recover the murder weapon as well as the weapon with which they had severed the victim’s ankles to fit the body in the suitcase,” said a senior officer of the Barasat police district.
Apart from the confessions of the arrested duo, cops are depending on the forensic analysis of the CCTV footage to establish the chain of events that started in Madhyamgram and terminated at the Ahiritola Ghat, around 24km away, in the jurisdiction of Kolkata Police.
“In some of the footages, it has been found that the women are wearing surgical masks. To rule out any confusion, we will submit a prayer before the court to allow us to carry out a gait pattern analysis,” said an investigator.
A gait pattern analysis is done to match the walking pattern of a suspect as seen in CCTV footage with that of the accused in custody, the officer said.
The mother and daughter have claimed that they killed their relative last Sunday and went to Burrabazar on Monday to purchase a big trolley bag to dispose of the body. They said they first tried to stuff the body in a smaller bag they had at home. But when it did not fit, they went to Burrabazar to buy a new bag.
The women have also reportedly claimed to have ordered some jewellery at a store in Burrabazar.
The police said they are yet to verify these claims and would do so once the women are in their custody.