Kamal Ghorui
MEERUT: A 30-year-old man in UP’s Bulandshahr district parted ways with his wife and allowed her to leave with her lover after screenshots of social media posts referencing “cement aur drum” (cement and drum) and “neela drum” (blue drum) were found on her phone, which he interpreted as a plot to kill him.The incident was brought to light after Rajkumar approached the police alleging that his wife, Sheetal, was in a relationship with Mukesh, a daily wager from a nearby village for over a year. Rajkumar and Sheetal, who have a two-year-old boy together, had been living separately for a while since then.“Once when I checked her phone, I found some nude photos, murder stories shared on Facebook captioned “cement aur drum”, alongside a picture of me with the words “neela drum aur cement”. Since then, I always feared that she would kill me,” said Rajkumar.The matter was resolved after police intervention. “Following counselling and legal intervention, the couple mutually agreed to separate, with no criminal case registered. Their two-year-old child will remain with Rajkumar, as Sheetal has declined to take custody. Further inquiry is underway,” women cell in-charge, Bobesh Dhiman, told TOI.“Now since she is not living with me anymore, at least I will look after my child and stay alive. Let her be happy in her own world,” said Rajkumar. Sheetal has since left to live with Mukesh.The case drew parallels with the Meerut “blue drum murder”, in which Muskan Rastogi and her partner Sahil Shukla allegedly killed her husband Saurabh Rajput and concealed the body in a cement-filled drum at their residence.
