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TRIBUNE EXCLUSIVE
Did murder suspect Maninder visit Chandigarh?
Prabhjot Singh
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 10
Did Maninderpal Singh Kohli, wanted by Scotland Yard in an abduction-rape-murder case, visit Chandigarh last month?

“Yes”, says his brother, Mr Ishtpal Singh Kohli, maintaining that “Maninder had come to visit his mother, who has been in coma since December last year. He came here on March 19. On March 28, he got a telephone call from England and he left us on March 29 saying that because of some problem he must to return to England immediately.”

It may be mentioned here that Maninderpal Singh is suspected to have murdered 17-year-old student Hannah Foster and allegedly fled from London a day after her body was discovered in Southampton. Hannah was not seen after March 14.

Detectives identified Maninder as a “strong” suspect following a tip off as a result of a nationwide television appeal on BBC’s Crimewatch UK programme, a PTI report from London had said.

The Indian office of Interpol reportedly received a request from Scotland Yard to arrest and extradite Maninderpal Singh. Scotland Yard was also contemplating sending a team of six detectives to trace him.

Mr Ishtpal Singh says: “The family is too shocked to read the news item about Maninderpal being named as the main suspect in the case. All our attempts to get in touch with him or his inlaws in England have been unsuccessful.

“In fact, Maninderpal has been attached to his mother who in December last year received a serious head injury after an accident with a bus. Since then she has been in coma. He wanted to come and settle down in India. That is why he sold his flat in England. He has some problems with his inlaws,” says Mr Ishtpal holding that Maninderpal had gone to England in 1994 on marriage basis.

His wife is a simpleton, says Ishtpal, but it is the “mother-in-law, who has been the trouble maker”.

The only other time Maninder came to India was in 1997, he said revealing that Maninderpal did not even come to attend his wedding.

“Our family has been passing through a tough time. Even after more than four months, my mother is in coma. After two months in the Intensive Care Unit at the PGI , the doctors advised us to take her home. Since I live on the first floor of a flat in Sector 44, we moved to a vacant flat of a relative in Phase X of SAS Nagar because of my mother,” adds Ishtpal Singh.

He says no one either from Scotland Yard or Punjab Police has contacted the family so far.

“He had told us that there was some problem in getting a passport for his younger son as the entire family wanted to come back and settle in Chandigarh because of our mother’s illness. Now, we all are worried about his welfare and whereabouts,” Ishtpal added.