President’s medallist cop gets lifer

Raigad / Mumbai: A Sessions Court in Panvel has awarded the life sentence to a convicted ex-policeman, and 7 years jail to two other accomplices for the sensational killing of his lover and a policewoman Ashwini Bidre-Gore, chopping and dumping her body pieces into the Thane Creek near Vasai, drawing curtains on the 9-year old case.

The convict, sacked ex-Senior Police Inspector (SrPI) Abhay Kurundkar of Thane Rural Police, was chosen for the President’s Gallantry Medal in 2017 - when he was a prime suspect in the case, but nabbed on Dec. 17, 2017 – earning the Court’s ire, while his accomplices are Kundan Bhandari and Mahesh Falnikar.

Special Public Prosecutor Pradip D. Gharat, who ably led the trial, told The Perfect Voice that the police would appeal for a higher sentence - death to Kurundkar, and also more punishment for the two accomplices.

Terming the case that raged in headlines for days as ‘the rarest of rare’, Judge K. G. Paldewar dwelt on the extreme brutality of the inhuman crime in the case trial which commenced in Nov. 2018, first in Alibaug and later transferred to the new Panvel Court.

The Judge emphasised how the father and minor daughter (now 15) of the victim Bidre-Gore, 35 – whose body was never recovered –were the real sufferers due to the brutal act of a colleague who cheated and then killed her, shocking the society.

Ending the long trial last week, the Panvel Court pronounced Kurundkar guilty for the murder, besides convicting Bhandari and Falnikar for tampering with the evidence, aiding and abetting a serious crime and other charges, and pronounced the quantum of punishment today.

Bhandari and Falnikar, who have already served the sentence as undertrials may be released, and another co-accused Raju Patil was acquitted earlier due to insufficient evidence.

Bidre-Gore was reported ‘missing’ in April 2016, and the crucial investigations started from the point where the police determined that she was ‘last seen’ with her colleague Kurundkar.

Court irked at top honour for a murder suspect 

On the eve of Republic Day in 2017, when Kurundkar was the prime suspect, his name figured for the President's Medal for Gallantry, earning the court’s ire.

Judge K. G. Paldewar wondered how such a coveted honour could be bestowed on a person facing a probe for murdering his colleague and questioned the integrity of the state police department.

Barely six days after the announcement, Kurundkar was booked by the police in the crime, and later as more skeletons tumbled out, he was suspended and then dismissed from police service, and the honour revoked.