Coffee with uncle costs north Delhi boy his life

New Delhi: Mohammad Anas didn't have a chance. The woman he called mother plotted his murder, and the man he had looked up to since his father's death slit his throat. They had planned out everything from the bait to the kill, but a careless call exposed them within 24 hours.
Anas was home on Sunday night when his uncle, Mohammad Shahnawaz, insisted on taking him out for coffee.The 18-year-old was surprised but he cared for coffee and his uncle's feelings too much to say "no". They left their ancestral house in Bara Hindu Rao, north Delhi, around 9.30pm and reached a café where two of Shahnawaz's men, Shahbaz and Sonu, were present.
After introductions, they ordered coffee and Shahnawaz managed to spike Anas' cup with sleeping pills. The boy started feeling drowsy and requested his uncle to take him back home. The party left the café on two scooters: Anas, his uncle and another man riding on one, and the fourth man alone on the second scooter.
By the time they reached Bonta Park, north Delhi, Anas was feeling sick and asked them to stop. Police say when he bent down to catch his breath, Sonu threw a nylon rope around his neck and strangulated him while Shahbaz stabbed him repeatedly with an ice pick. Anas collapsed bleeding profusely, and Shahnawaz slit his throat with a knife. The trio left the body under a tree where it was found by passers-by on Monday.
Police say Anas was killed for the cash and family business he had inherited on his father's death last year. Anas had been running the business in the Azadpur wholesale market since he turned 18. Shahnawaz has allegedly confessed that he was in a relationship with Anas' stepmother Rubina, and they both were after the boy's wealth. Rubina had debts of her own to pay off while Shahnawaz wanted to take over the business.
Police became suspicious about Shahnawaz's involvement in the crime when they accompanied him to recover the body on Monday. They found him tampering with the evidence, and on checking his call record noticed a suspicious pattern of calls between him and Rubina. Not only did the men call her after the murder, she and Shahnawaz had made several calls to each other, using different SIM cards each time.
To ward off suspicion, Rubina herself reported Anas missing, but for all her caution and scheming, she made the fatal mistake of using the same mobile phone to call up the accused.
DCP north Madhur Verma said a team led by special staff inspector Dhiraj Kumar tracked down the killers after finding that they were making calls on mobile phones used by Anas' family members. A case was registered against all four and a team has been sent to arrest Rubina from her village in UP.