Chandrakant JHA
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Beheading - Dismemberment - He committed the murders to avenge the police harassment he faced
Number of victims: 3 - 7
Date of murders: 1998 / 2003 - 2007
Date of arrest: May 20, 2007
Date of birth: 1967
Victims profile: Men (his employees)
Method of murder: Strangulation with a nan chaku (a chain attached to two wooden handles used by martial arts practitioners)
Location: New Delhi, India
Status: Sentenced to death in February 5, 2013
Serial killer Chandrakant Jha ate dinner in the same room where his victims lay dead
By Shana Shakil - Mail Today
New Delhi, February 19, 2013
He would help them get a job, provide them meals and pamper them like his children; then he would kill them savagely at the slightest provocation and scatter their mutilated limbs in different parts of Delhi. This is how serial killer Chandrakant Jha functioned.
Jha, said to be involved in many such killings, showed no signs of remorse as a Delhi court ordered the gallows for him last week in two cases. Taking into account the brutality with which the crimes were committed, additional sessions judge Kamini Lau refused to show any leniency saying he cannot be reformed.
His first murder was recorded in 1998 and he remained behind bars for more than three years, but was released in 2002 for lack of evidence. Following this, he went on to murder and mutilate at least six more. Though he was arrested in connection with these six killings, he managed to escape the noose in four of them, again due to lack of evidence.
Jha consistently evaded the police by dismembering his victims and scattering the body parts around the city, making it hard for the cops to identify the victims and the perpetrator of the crimes. He would do all this for the sheer thrill of challenging the law enforcement agencies, and this was his way of taking revenge on the Delhi Police for their "atrocities" against him, according to Jha. In two cases, a note was also recovered with the mutilated body parts found outside Tihar Jail.
Judge Lau also took serious note of Jha's allegation against the police that he committed the murders to avenge the police harassment he faced. According to police records, a total of 14 FIRs, including seven murder cases, were lodged against Jha.
Jha used to help young men, usually migrants from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, get petty jobs. He would keep them at his house in JJ Colony, Hyderpur and is said to have treated them like his children. But, at times, petty things such as drinking, smoking, lying and being non-vegetarian would be enough to prompt a murder. He would begin the "death ritual" mostly around 8 pm by tying his victim's hands on the pretext of punishing him. He would then strangle him using a nunchaku.
After killing his victims, he preferred to have dinner in the same room where his victims lay lifeless. In his own words, he is a specialist in chopping bodies. Following his arrest after his final murder in 2007, he confessed that he had perfected the art of cutting bodies leading to minimum blood oozing out after mutilation.
Though Jha has been sent to the gallows for his gruesome crimes, the court pointed out the necessity for police reforms.
For 'brutal and diabolical' murder, Chandrakant Jha gets death
By Aneesha Mathur - IndianExpress.com
New Delhi, Wed Feb 06, 2013
For the second of the three murders that he was held guilty of, Chandrakant Jha (46) was handed the death penalty by a city court on Tuesday.
Jha has been held guilty for the murders of Dalip (25), Upender Singh (20) and Amit — between November 2006 and May 2007. He has also been named as an accused in at least four other murder cases.
Additional Sessions Judge Kamini Lau sentenced Jha to death for the murder of Upender Singh in April 2007. On Monday, Jha was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Dalip.
The court held that Jha "followed a definite pattern" in the multiple murders, where he "killed the victims by decapitating their heads and, thereafter, chopped the body and threw the decapitated bodies of these young men outside the Tihar Central Jail and scattered their dismembered body parts at various places around Delhi."
ASJ Lau said Upender had been decapitated in an "extremely brutal, diabolical, revolting and dastardly manner" and held that the case fell within the definition of "rarest of the rare" since it was not only "in cold blood and without any immediate provocation", but there was also the "probability that the convict would again commit a similar act of violence and constitute a continuing threat to the society".
A resident of Maharajganj in Uttar Pradesh, Upender worked with Jha in the Azadpur Sabzi Mandi and lived with with him in Haiderpur.
Jha reportedly never expressed any remorse for his actions. He instead dared police to catch him in letters left with the dismembered bodies.
Upender's headless and limbless body was found packed in a carton outside Gate 3 of Tihar Jail, from which the Forensic teams lifted Jha's fingerprints, tying him to the crime.
Jha threw one arm outside Tis Hazari court. The other arm and the genitals were packed in two cartons and left by Jha at a fruit market in Loni, East Delhi.
One of Upender's legs was found near Ram Mandir in Pitampura. His head was never found, and he was identified through DNA match with his parents.
Upender's relative Pankaj Rathore testified that when he had asked Jha about Upender over the phone, Jha told him that Upender had been "sent where he deserved".
Noting the manner in which Jha had befriended and brutally murdered his victims, the court observed that he did "not possess basic humanness and lacked the psyche or mind-set, which may be amenable for any reform."
For first of three murders, 46-year-old gets life in jail
By Aneesha Mathur - IndianExpress.com
New Delhi, Tue Feb 05, 2013
Sentencing him in the first of the three murder cases he has been convicted, a Delhi court on Monday awarded life imprisonment to Chandrakant Jha, making clear that he will have to spend the rest of his life in jail.
The court said Jha "followed a definite pattern" in the multiple murders: he "killed the victims by decapitating their heads... chopped their various body parts... threw the decapitated bodies... outside the Central Jail, Tihar and scattered dismembered body parts at various places around Delhi".
Additional Sessions Judge Kamini Lau sentenced Jha, a 46-year-old from Madhepura in Bihar who worked as a fruit-seller, after finding him guilty of the murder of 25-year-old Dalip.
Commenting on the "exceptional depravity and extreme brutality" of the murders, the court said the post-mortem report had "confirmed" that "death in this case was a result of decapitation" and not a case where the head was cut off after death.
Jha has also been convicted of the murder of two other men, Upendra and Amit. For these, separate sentences will be pronounced on Tuesday and Wednesday. Senior Public Prosecutor P K Verma said the prosecution has demanded the death penalty for Jha for "aggravated offence" in the remaining two cases.
In Dalip's case, his dismembered torso was left outside Gate No.1 of Tihar Jail on May 18, 2007. His arms and genitals were found outside the Tis Hazari court in a carton the next morning. The police received a phone call — it was later proved to have been made by Jha — informing them about the body outside Tihar. The police also came across legs near the Kishanganj nullah. After the arrest of Jha, a skull was recovered from the banks of the Yamuna.
In its order, the court pulled up the police for not having been able to identify Dalip and failing to trace his family. No formal identification was done of the body and the court records name him "Dalip" only because Jha identified him as such. The police have been directed to preserve DNA evidence from the body and "ensure that coordinated steps are taken along with counterparts in Bihar" to trace the family of the victim.
Noting that the "intent of the convict was to cause public outrage", the court observed that Jha made PCR calls in two cases to inform police about the bodies, and also wrote letters, daring the police to catch him.
In a three-page letter found with Dalip's body, Jha threatened to "send similar gifts" to the police every 15 days.
Jha had pleaded for leniency, saying he has five minor daughters, the oldest of whom is about 14 years old. He also said his family is completely dependent on him. But the court said he is a "mission-oriented and task-oriented serial killer whose only motive/mission is to expose, mock and challenge the police".
Serial killer Chandrakant Jha sentenced to death
IndiaNews.com
February 5, 2013
New Delhi, Feb 5: Serial killer Chandrakant Jha was today sentenced to death for the second case of identical crime by a Delhi Court which said his offence falls under the "rarest of rare case" as the brutality committed by him shows he "cannot be reformed".
Jha's modus operandi was to behead and chop the body parts of the victims leading to their death. He then dumped the headless bodies outside Tihar Jail.
Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Kamini Lau said, "He be hanged by the neck till he is dead" for taking away the life of 19-year-old Upender as his brutality showed he does not possess "basic humanness".
"Aapko Sazaae maut sunayi gayi hai ise mukadame me (You have been awarded death penalty in this case)," the judge told 46-year-old Jha, who looked nervous in the court during the time of sentencing, when he came in front near the dais.
The court also said there was a probability that Jha, a native of Madhepura in Bihar, would again commit a similar act of violence and constitute a continuing threat to the society, that is, the challenge and threats which he had given to the system to nab him stating that he will send similar gifts (decapitating bodies) after every 15 days.
"The convict is a menace to the society and the manner in which he has engaged himself into senseless serial killings shows that he is beyond reform.
"Certain category of perpetrators of crime who if not removed from the circulation of the society would destroy it," the court said. It also imposed a fine of Rs 20,000 on Jha.
Jha, who has sought the copy of judgment in Hindi, was today sentenced to death in the second of the three murder cases in which he has been convicted.
Yesterday, he was sentenced by the same court to life imprisonment till his death in another case of murder, in which also he had chopped off the head and limbs of the victim and had dumped the body near Tihar Jail here.
Public Prosecutor P K Verma said that in this case, on the intervening night of April 24-25, 2007, Jha had chopped the head, hands, legs and private parts of Upender, who was residing with him, leading to his death.
Jha then wrapped the beheaded body of Upender in a gunny bag and dumped it outside gate number 3 of Central Jail, Tihar here, prosecution said.
Jha, who was sent to jail for seven years for destroying the evidence in order to screen himself from punishment, had thrown the head and other body parts of the victim at various places here, it said.
He was arrested by the Delhi Police in May 25, 2007 in Mianwali Nagar here.
The court noted that after committing the murders, Jha had even threatened and challenged the police by writing several letters to them to nab him and that he would send "similar gifts" (beheaded bodies) to it after every 15 days.
The sentencing in the remaining murder case in which Jha had beheaded one Anil in 2006 in a similar manner will be pronounced tomorrow.
While sentencing, the court noted that Jha was involved in 14 criminal cases including seven murder cases.
Amicus curiae Deepak Sharma, appearing for Jha, had sought a lenient view towards the convict on the ground that he is a patient of asthma and any stern view will cause mental, financial and social trauma to his wife and five minor daughters.
The court, however, turned down his plea saying that the manner of killing is "extremely brutal, grotesque and diabolical so as to arose intense and extreme indignation of the community."
"Mental/physical suffering inflicted on the victim before his death is immense. There is significant degree of planning on the part of Jha while committing the murder," it said.
While holding that the case falls within the category of "rarest of rare case", the court said that the murder of Upender was in cold blood without any immediate provocation by the victim.
The judge said the intention of the convict was to cause public outrage only because he wanted to avenge the wrong done to him by the police system in falsely implicating him in cases and to some extend he succeed in it.
The court also said that Jha's act of threatening the police that he would sent such gifts again reflects "lack of remorse" and his intention to "repeat his criminal act".
Jha was arrested in 1998 in connection with a murder case but was acquitted for want of evidence. In December 2007, a Delhi court had acquitted him after the police had failed to file charge sheet against him in another murder case.
The police had said Jha had invited his victims to stay with him and took good care of them. After some time, he would get annoyed with them easily and took offence to their activities, it had said.
Court releases 'Serial killer' in murder case
Indopia.in
New Delhi, December 5, 2007
Chandrakant Jha, who is accused of killing people and dumping their bodies in front of Tihar jail, was today released by a court here in a murder case after police found no evidence against him.
Metropolitan Magistrate Manish Gupta ordered the release of Jha, arrested for the sensational serial killings, in the four-year-old murder case of one Umesh after the Investigating Officer (IO) submitted that there was no evidence against him.
An FIR was registered with Hari Nagar police station on November 20, 2003 following recovery of a body in a white-bag outside gate number one of Tihar Jail here. The police later identified the body as that of Umesh.
Jha, arrested on May 20, was accused of several killings including the murder of Umesh, 26, by the police following his disclosure statement.
"In view of the circumstances and material on record and submissions of the prosecution and investigating officer, I am of the considered opinion that there is no sufficient evidence against the accused. He may be released in the present case," the court said.
In the application seeking release of Jha, IO Ombir Singh said that there was no cogent evidence against him except his alleged disclosure statement.
"The accused was taken on two days police remand but no recovery could be effected from him," Singh said.
The police have so far filed three chargesheets against Jha, who hails from Madhepura in Bihar, in as many murder cases invoking Sections 302 (murder) and 201 (destruction of evidence) of the IPC.
The police had alleged that Jha, 40, now in judicial custody, murdered his three associates Amit, Dilip and Upendra after taking offence to their "drinking, eating meat and womanising".
Serial killer let off for want of evidence
TribuneIndia.com
New Delhi, December 5, 2007
A city court today released Chandrakant Jha, accused of killing several people and dumping their bodies in front of the Tihar Jail, after the police did not find any evidence against him.
Metropolitan magistrate Manish Gupta ordered the release of Jha in the case relating to the murder of one Umesh, four years ago, after the investigating officer submitted that there was no evidence against him.
An FIR was registered with the Hari Nagar police station on November 20, 2003, following the recovery of Umesh’s body in a bag outside gate no 1 of Tihar Jail.
Jha, arrested on May 20, was accused of several killings including the murder of Umesh, 26.
“In view of the circumstances and material on record and submissions of the prosecution and the investigating officer, I am of the considered opinion that there is no sufficient evidence against the accused. He may be released in the present case,” the judge said.
In the application seeking release of Jha, investigating officer Ombir Singh said that there was no cogent evidence against him except his alleged disclosure statement.
“The accused was taken on two days’ police remand, but no recovery could be effected from him,” Singh said.
The police have so far filed three chargesheets against Jha, who hails from Madhepura in Bihar, in as many murder cases invoking Sections 302 (murder) and 201 (destruction of evidence) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The police had alleged that Jha, 40, now in judicial custody for the other murder cases, killed his three associates Amit, Dilip and Upendra after taking offence to their “drinking, eating meat and womanising”.
At the time of Jha’s arrest, the police had claimed that Jha was a psychopath, as he “enjoyed” each of his killings. “He used to kill people, after he got annoyed with the victims, who had worked with him, over trifling issues,” said joint commissioner of police Rajesh Kumar.
Delhi police file third chargesheet against 'serial killer'
Zeenews.com
October 5, 2007
Delhi police have filed their third chargesheet in a court here against Chandrakant Jha, whose alleged serial killings and dumping of bodies outside the Tihar Jail here had created sensation in the capital a few months ago.
In the chargesheet filed in the court of Metropolitan Magistrate Manish Gupta, the police accused Jha of murder of one Upendra Rathore (22), originally hailing from Maharajganj district in Uttar Pradesh, after an altercation with regard to a mobile phone.
Rathore's torso was recovered from a carton outside the Tihar Jail on April 25.
The police, which invoked sections 302 (murder) and 201 (destruction of evidence) of the IPC against the accused, had recovered parts of the Rathore's body including private parts and severed left hand from a carton at a place under Loni police station in Ghaziabad district on April 29.
Other severed parts of the body were later discovered from Pitampura here by the police.
In their six-page chargesheet, the police referred to the disclosure statements of the accused and DNA report of the deceased's parents to corroborate the charges against Jha, who used to sell vegetables in Azadpur here.
As many as 62 witnesses have been named by the police in the chargesheet to substantiate their allegations against Jha, who is allegedly involved in as many as six murders.
The police had found first body outside Tihar Jail on October 28, 2006 with a note daring them to "catch me if you can". Two more bodies were recovered on December 20, 2006 and April 25 this year.
The story of a serial killer
Express News Service - Cities.ExpressIndia.com
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
* CHANDRAKANT PAMPERED HIS VICTIMS FIRST * KILLED THEM AT THE SLIGHTEST PROVOCATION * HIS FIRST RECORDED MURDER WAS IN 1998 * HE WAS ACQUITTED * CAME OUT OF JAIL TO KILL 6 MORE
New Delhi, May 21: CHANDRAKANT Jha, who was detained on Sunday on suspicion of being the serial killer who had been placing dismembered bodies outside Tihar Jail. today confessed his crime to police.
“He (Jha) was arrested from his hideout in Hyderpur, near Shalimar Bagh, on Sunday. He has confessed to murdering seven people... He used to chop off their bodies and dump the torso in front of Tihar Jail,” Joint Commissioner of Police Rajesh Kumar told the media today.
Police say it was the sheer thrill of killing that drove Jha (40), who would buy vegetables in bulk and sell it to retailers, to kill some of his employees. Police have not been able identify Jha’s victims; the serial killer has merely disclosed their names and is mum on other details.
Police have videographed Jha’s confession in which the killer has described the way he killed his victims and the reason why he killed them.
The 40-year-old used to employ young men, usually migrants from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, and as Kumar put it: “All his victims were his employees and Jha used to keep them in JJ Colony, Hyderpur. He says he used to take care of them like children and gave them shelter. But at times petty things would annoy him. And the punishment for such a breach of behavior was death.”
The JCP says Jha has admitted to killing his victims for reasons as trivial as their eating meat or drinking alcohol.
Describing the way Jha killed his victims, Kumar said: “He would first tie the hands of his victims on the pretext of punishing them. And since they were all so close to him, the victims never expected that they would meet a fatal end.”
The killings would commence around 8 pm.
After tying up his victims, he would strangle them using a nan chaku (a chain attached to two wooden handles used by martial arts practitioners).
Jha would then have his dinner in the same room and afterwards, cut off the victim’s head and limbs.
“Jha claimed he was an expert in cutting up bodies. He used to cut them in a way to ensure that minimum blood oozed out of the body,” Kumar said.
The killer would then pack off the body parts in a plastic bag. And around 4 am, he would load the body parts onto his scooter engine-fitted cycle rickshaw and drive till Tihar to dump the torso. Astonishingly, no one spotted Jha dumping the torsos near Tihar Jail.
“He used to dump the head and limbs in the Yamuna. In one of the latest cases, he dumped the limbs of a victim, Dilip, near Tis Hazari court,” Kumar said.
Who is Chandrakant Jha?
Chandrakant Jha, the man Delhi Police claims is the serial killer who dumped six bodies in front of Tihar Jail in the past six years, was born in Ghosai village of Bihar's Madhepura district. Having studied up to Class X he came to Delhi in 1986 and started working as a labourer in Subzi Mandi.
Jha has married twice—he abandoned his first wife, and within a year married one Mamta, who came from Madhubani, Bihar. The couple has five daughters aged between 2 and 10 years.
The police say he changed residence routinely, always living away from his family—he was based in Hyderpur, while his family lived in Alipur.
Jha was involved in three cases of burglaries in 1997; three Arms Act cases were also registered against him. In 1998, he was arrested on his first murder charge. He remained in jail till 2002 but the case ended in his acquittal.
The victims
1998: Jha's first murder was Mangal, alias Aurangzeb, in Adarsh Nagar. He was arrested and remained in jail till 2002
June 2003: Murdered one of his associates, Shekhar, accusing him of being a drunkard and liar. He threw the body in Alipur
November 2003: Murdered Umesh, who worked with him, for lying and betraying him, Jha has told the cops. He threw the body near gate number 1 of Tihar Jail. A case was registered on November 20, 2003 at Hari Nagar Police Station
November 2005: Killed his third associate, Guddu, because he did not like the latter's extravagant lifestyle and the fact that he smoked ganja. The body was found near Sulabh Sauchalya in Mongol Puri, northwest Delhi
October 2006: Amit was the fourth associate to be murdered; Jha told police that he killed Amit for being a womaniser. The torso was thrown in front of Tihar Jail on October 20
April 2007: The fifth associate to be murdered was Upender, allegedly for having an affair with the daughter of one his friends.
May 2007: Dilip, the sixth associate to be murdered, for Jha did not like the fact that Dilip ate non-vegetarian food. His body was found outside Tihar on May 18.
How the serial killer was nabbed
Sobhana K - Cities.ExpressIndia.com
May 23, 2007
Jha’s letter after his fourth murder gave enough leads; call to SHO added some more, say police
New Delhi, May 22: BY the time Chandrakant Jha committed his sixth murder this April and dumped his associate Upender’s body near Tihar Jail’s gate number 3, the police had already short-listed him as one of the four accused and even had his photograph, it was revealed today.
“We had been closing in on him since last October 20 when Jha committed his fifth murder. There were many clues that led us to him,” a senior police officer said today.
According to police, Jha’s first mistake was to send a letter to the police after leaving his fourth victim’s (Amit) torso in front of Tihar last October 20. Jha had blamed former Additional Deputy Commissioner Manish Agarwal and Head Constable Balbir Singh in the letter for forcing him to take to the killing spree.
Agarwal was the additional DCP in North West district in 2003, while Singh was the warden of jail number 3 during this period.
This, the police said, was the first clue.
In the letter Jha also admitted to having committed a murder in November 2003 and dumping the body near Tihar. That, a police official said, was the second clue. “It proved that he was already out of Tihar by November 2003, so we had to look for a person who was lodged before 2003,” the officer said.
Jha’s letter also blamed Agarwal for trapping him in a false case. From this the police concluded that the killer was involved in a criminal case in North West district in 2003.
Another clue that came from the letter, the officer said, was the revelation that he was externed due to these cases.
According to the officer, Jha made another mistake by calling up the Hari Nagar SHO immediately after dumping the body last October 20. “We ensured that the SHO spoke with the killer as long as possible and got more clues,” the officer said. “The conversation lasted for seven minutes.”
The hunt is on
After the phone conversation with the SHO, police had more than a sketchy idea who they were looking for: a suspect involved in crime in North West district in 2003, who was externed and was, prior to November 2003, lodged in jail number 3 of Tihar.
After verifying records of more than 800 suspects, the police narrowed down the list to four, including Jha, the officer said.
“Our next clue was to compare handwriting on the note found with the bodies and handwritten statement of externees.”
Before April 25 this year, when Jha committed his sixth murder, the police had photographs of all four accused and had zeroed in on Jha, the officer said. The seventh murder on April 25, however, came as a shock to the police as they did not expect the killer to strike in such quick succession, the officer said.
“By then we suspected Jha was the killer but the difficult part was identifying his hideout because he changed his address every fortnight,” the officer said. “We knew at least four hideouts: Yamuna Vihar, Alipur, Badola village and Haidarpur.”
But before they could reach him, police said Jha killed Dilip and dumped the torso in front of Tihar’s gate number 1 on May 18.
“Our last clue was that he drove a scooter-fitted rickshaw,” the officer said. “We combed all four places and finally found him in Alipur while he was eating halwa with his children.”
Cops get cell numbers of last two victims
The police today recovered mobile numbers of Upender and Dilip, who the police say were the sixth and seventh victims of Chandrakant Jha. The police have launched a hunt to identify the six allegedly killed by Jha is the past four years. “Our first priority would e to search for the victim’s family,” Joint Commissioner Rajesh Kumar said.
Meanwhile, a team of divers was sent to the Yamuna to look for the body parts as Jha claimed that he the severed parts in the river. Jha is in police custody for seven days.
