Police say 17-year-old has confessed to killing farmer

Pune: Three days after a 43-year-old farmer from Varude village near Shikrapur, about 35km from Pune, was found dead, the Pune Rural police on Wednesday detained a minor youth on the charge of murder.

Police said the accused murdered the farmer, Balasaheb Tambe, by slitting his throat following an old dispute.

Inspector Chandrashekhar Yadav of the Shikrapur police said that Tambe and his mother were sleeping outside their house. Around 1.30am on June 8, Tambe’s mother woke up after hearing some noise. She saw her son bleeding profusely and someone running away from the spot.

Tambe’s elder brother took him to a hospital, where doctors declared him dead. “Tambe’s throat was slit with a sharp weapon,” Yadav said.

The officer said that the Shikrapur police and the crime branch swung into action and started collecting information about Tambe. “We found that Tambe had recently had heated arguments with a minor (17). We took the boy into custody for questioning. During the questioning, the boy admitted to killing Tambe. We have recovered a billhook from him,” the officer said.

Yadav said that the youth revealed that about two years ago, he had entered into a brawl with Tambe. Recently, the duo again had heated arguments. At that time, Tambe had threatened him.

“Furious over this, the youth hatched a plot to kill Tambe. He slit Tambe’s throat while he was fast asleep,” Yadav said.