Palghar, Maharashtra: a home-owner was jolted when he opened his tenant’s room after he found a woman’s skeletal remains in a plastic water drum.

The Palghar Police are investigating the incident.

It is likely that authorities will be sending a team to Bihar, UP, to pick up the suspects.

Lokesh Mithalal Jain opened the room forcefully after it had been closed for the past 18 months.

His tenants went away last year and stopped paying rent for the past 5 months.

Jain lodged an official complaint about the incident.

Investigating officer Pradip Kasbe of Boisar MIDC Police Station said:

The complainant said that the tenants had left in February 2019, promising to return, and instructed him not to give the room away to anybody else. They continued to pay the monthly rent of Rs4,000 (Dh196.42) via electronic transfer from Belwara village in Bihar’s Saharsa district. However, the rent suddenly stopped coming around six months ago.

The body is believed to be the remains of 20-year-old Bulbul Deepak Jha, who was living with her husband Deepak, 25.

50-year-old Pawan Jha and 45-year-old Bachhudevi, the in-laws, and Neetu Mukesh Thakur, the sister-in-law of the victim, were living with the family.

According to a statement of Jain, Bulbul was brutally assaulted by her husband.

She was also set on fire, where she sustained burn injuries. The event forced her to lodge a police complaint.

The police then arrested her husband but was later released on bail.

Preliminary investigations suggest that the family killed the woman and left her remains in the room.

An official investigation is being conducted and the authorities are trying to arrest the suspects, who are believed to be in Bihar.