Mukesh Jaiswal

Money was the root cause of the murder of young restaurateur Mukesh Jaiswal, police said on Wednesday.

Preliminary findings indicate that Mukesh, one of the four co-owners of the popular City Centre restaurant Kaafila and its new branch on Theatre Road, was either strangulated or smothered to death in a car before being dumped in a sewer.

The 30-year-old had gone missing on Sunday evening after leaving City Centre in a taxi. His mud-caked body was found in a sewer near BT College in New Barrackpore on Monday morning and identified by a cousin on Tuesday.

An investigating officer said Mukesh was possibly the victim of a financial dispute triggered by his alleged habit of lending money from Vanijya Pvt Ltd, the company he had formed with three close friends, to other people he knew. “He might have pressured these people to return the money and fallen foul of them,” a police officer said.

Avishek Jaiswal, one of Mukesh’s three business partners, also spoke about money but turned the police’s theory on its head. He said Mukesh was in debt rather than someone whom other people owed money.

“We were like brothers. We were equal shareholders in the businesses we owned (Kaafila, Kaafila Express and a discotheque, The Apartment). But we were unaware of Mukesh being in debt until people from banks started frequenting Kaafila to ask for him around four-five months ago,” Avishek told Metro.

He claimed that Mukesh was officially distanced from Kaafila Express during the dhaba-restaurant’s opening last week because he had himself asked his partners not to include him in any kind of promotional activity.

“We don’t know the extent of his debt, he never gave us any figures…he didn’t discuss personal matters. So we didn’t feel even for once that he was tense about anything,” Avishek said.

Although Mukesh’s wallet, gold chains and diamond-studded bracelet were not found on him, the police have ruled out robbery as the motive.

Based on the call records of Mukesh’s two cellphone connections, investigators have surmised that he or the killers — or all of them — were at Pathuriaghata, in Posta, around 11.30pm on Sunday.

“There was no reason for him to go there. He left City Centre for Kaafila Express around 7.30pm and was to return home by 10pm. His wife Pooja spoke to him over phone at 8.30pm and he said that he would be home soon. He didn’t visit the Theatre Road restaurant, which means he went elsewhere to meet someone,” said Mohanlal Jaiswal, a relative of the victim.

The call records of the businessman’s Airtel connection revealed that three missed calls went from that phone to one of his friends around 5pm on Monday, long after the murder. “The tower location indicates that Mukesh’s friend was in Rajarhat when the missed calls came. We are interrogating this friend,” an officer said.

Mukesh’s wife and the couple’s infant son Yuvraj had accompanied him to City Centre in their Skoda Octavia on Sunday afternoon.

He then took a taxi so that his wife and son could return home by car.

Mukesh’s family dropped the demand for a second post-mortem after a murder investigation was initiated.

Mukesh’s body was cremated at Nimtala ghat late on Wednesday.