Aftab Poonawala is an Indian food blogger who murdered his live-in partner, Shraddha in 2022 by slicing her body into 35 pieces and disposing of them in the Chhatarpur forest area of Delhi.
PERSONAL INFORMATION
Aftab Amin Poonawala was born in Vasai, Maharashtra on Thursday, June 23, 1994.
Aftab Poonawala is from a middle-class family in Mumbai’s Diwanman, Vasai West.
Amin Jafarali Poonawala, Aftab’s father, is a wholesale shoe dealer, and Munira Amin Poonawala is a housewife. Ahad Amin Poonawala is Aftab’s younger brother. He is single.
Aftab Poonawala practises Islam. He is a member of the Khoja group, a Muslim community that switched from Hinduism to Islam in the 14th century due to peer/pir influence (the Sufi spiritual guides).
EDUCATION
In Vasai West, Maharashtra, he attended St. Francis High School. He earned a Bachelor of Management Studies degree at L. S. Raheja College in Mumbai from 2012 to 2015.
According to accounts, Aftab enrolled in one of Santacruz’s colleges but dropped out halfway through.
After discontinuing his education, Aftab Poonawala began food blogging and created a social media profile called ‘Hungrychokro Escapades.’ Aftab launched this firm alongside his brother, who handled photos for the page.
PHYSICAL APPEARANCE
Height (approx.): 5′ 6″
Hair Colour: Black
Eye Colour: Black
INCIDENT
According to reports, Aftab Poonawala, a graphic designer, met Shraddha Vikas Walker, an IT-based contact centre employee, in Mumbai in 2018 via the dating app ‘Bumble’ DNA. Soon after, the couple fell in love and decided to stay together.
According to several media sites, Aftab and Shraddha were married for three years. According to sources, the couple moved to Delhi in March 2022 after receiving criticism from their parents and began residing in a rented house in the Chhatarpur district of Mehrauli. Shraddha reportedly left her house and informed her parents that she was an adult and could make her own decisions.
Shraddha’s friend, Rajat Shukla, revealed in an interview that Shraddha once told her friends that Aftab would frequently beat her and that she wanted to leave him but couldn’t. Rajat Shukla stated that Shradhha told her friends that she had been dating Aftab since 2018. “Today, unexpectedly, the news of her murder flashed on my phone,” Rajat Shukla said. I was deeply disturbed to learn that my friend had been slain. She revealed to us in 2019 that she has been in a relationship since 2018. They shared a home. They lived happily at first, but Shraddha began to accuse Aaftab of beating her. She wanted to leave him but was unable to do so.”
Shraddha and Aftab allegedly had regular disagreements after moving to Delhi because Shraddha allegedly used to force him to marry her; nonetheless, the couple decided to go on a trip to the hills in March and April to start again. On 18 May 2022, after allegedly being pressured by Shraddha to marry, Aftab strangled Shraddha to death and chopped off her body into 35 parts, which he kept in a 300-litre refrigerator in his rented flat in Delhi, and was disposed of in a row in and around the city in the middle of the night.
According to several media outlets, Aftab viewed a lot of crime movies and web series before carrying out the murder. According to reports, Aftab got the idea from ‘Dexter,’ an American crime thriller web series about a man who commits crimes at night and spends his days solving them. According to Delhi police sources, Aftab killed Shraddha with a single weapon, a small saw, and then dumped her garments into a rubbish van. Aftab used Shraddha’s social media and paid her credit card payments till June 2022 to avoid suspicion.
According to reports, in September 2022, one of Shraddha’s friends informed her father that she had not been in contact with his daughter for nearly 2.5 months, prompting Shraddha’s father to file a missing report on 12 October 2022 at Manickpur police station in Vasai, Maharashtra; however, the case was transferred to Mehrauli police station in New Delhi based on Shraddha’s last location.
Her father suspected Aftab of being involved in his daughter’s disappearance. According to sources, on 3 November 2022, Aftab was summoned for questioning by Mumbai police, where he stated that Shraddha left the residence following the altercation in May.
On 11 November 2022, Aftab was arrested at his home in Chhatarpur on IPC sections 302 (murder) and 201. (causing disappearance of evidence of an offence committed).
On November 14, 2022, accused Aftab Poonawala was arrested along with Delhi police forces at Mehrauli Police Station in New Delhi.
Ankit Chauhan, Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), South Delhi, told the media in an interview that Aftab confessed to his crime and stated he disposed of Shraddha’s body in the forest regions near Chhatarpur Enclave. “The accused told us that he chopped her body into pieces and disposed of them in forest regions around Chhatarpur Enclave,” Ankit Chauhan added. He’s been arrested, and an investigation is underway.”
Aftab Poonawala, the accused, was led to a wooded region in Chhatarpur, Delhi, where he allegedly disposed of portions of Shraddha’s body.
According to the sources, Aftab would wrap the body in black foil and throw it into the forest without the foil. He would also feed some of the scraps to the stray animals.
According to the officials, he googled how to clean blood stains on the floor.
According to media reports, Aftab Poonawala was presented with the fact that strangling Shraddha to death was less difficult than disposing of her body.
According to police officials, Aftab continued to live in the same apartment after murdering Shraddha and dated other women who allegedly visited him at the flat; however, Aftab’s account on the dating app ‘Bumble’ was being used to track down women who visited him at the flat within 15-20 days of Shraddha’s murder.
According to accounts, Shraddha’s father, Vikash Walker, approached the case from the perspective of “love jihad” and wanted the death punishment for the guilty. In an interview, Vikas Walker stated, “I suspected a love jihad angle.” We demand that Aftab be executed. I believe the Delhi Police and the investigation are on the correct track. Shraddha was close to her uncle and didn’t say much to me. I never got in touch with Aftab. “I filed the first complaint in Vasai, Mumbai.”
An inquiry found that Shraddha had complained to police in Tilunj, Vasai, Maharashtra, that she was afraid Aftab would cut her up. She allegedly protested to the police in a letter dated November 23, 2020, after Aftab assaulted her in their shared flat. “Today he attempted to kill me by choking me, and he scares and blackmails me that he will kill me, chop me up in pieces, and toss me away,” she wrote. He’s been assaulting me for six months, but I didn’t have the courage to report to the police because he threatened to kill me.”
