Kochi: Maradu police have officially confirmed that the death of a young woman found on a railway track in Kochi’s Vyttila in the early hours of Tuesday was a premeditated murder, leading to the swift identification and arrest of the accused.

The deceased has been identified as Sudha Baby (45) a native of Chingavanam in Kottayam, who was staying in Poothotta in Ernakulam. The police have arrested a man named KV Shaji, a resident of Ponnurunni, Kochi, in connection with the crime.

The breakthrough in the case came within hours of the discovery, primarily driven by critical digital and physical evidence. Sudha’s phone was found near the body, and it helped the police to identify the victim.

A major turning point occurred when police reviewed CCTV footage from the surrounding area and found that Shaji and Sudha had been seen together earlier that night. One of the footages showed Shaji walking with the victim towards the railway track and later returning and leaving the place alone with visible bloodstains on his shirt. Additionally, Sudha’s phone helped the police to establish her link to the accused. According to the police, Shaji, a retired High Court official, had known Sudha for a long time.

“The accused and the victim were in a relationship. But recently, the relationship strained for various reasons, and the accused planned to murder her. On Monday night he picked her up from Poothotta and brought her to the spot in his car. There, they had a fight, and Shaji assaulted her and murdered her. The plan was to dump the body on the railway track so that it would appear as an accident,” said police sources.

The suspect’s attempt to stage the scene as a railway accident ultimately failed because he placed the body on a secondary, non-operational track beneath the Vyttila railway overpass. Since no trains run on that specific line, the location immediately signalled foul play to the responding officers.

The body was first spotted around 1:45 am on Tuesday by the locopilot of an express train passing on the adjacent active line. Upon alerting the Railway Protection Force, which alerted the police, the Maradu police and forensic experts arrived to find severe injuries on the woman's face and body that were entirely inconsistent with a high-speed train impact, further solidifying the murder theory.

Police sources indicate that a fight broke out between the two near the tracks, which escalated into a fatal physical assault. Following the completion of inquest formalities, Sudha's body was shifted to the Kalamassery Medical College, where a post-mortem examination was carried out.

“Preliminary reports after the postmortem suggest that severe head injury was the cause of death. The victim’s nasal bone was also fractured. It appears the accused has hit her head on the rough ground near the tracks, leading to the injury and subsequent death. He then placed the body on the track without realising that it was non-operational,” said police sources.