Mumbai Crime Branch officers on Tuesday arrested Sajjad Mughal, who was convicted in 2014 for the August 2012 murder of lawyer Pallavi Purkayastha. Police sources say that Mughal was nabbed from Sonmarg in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K). Mughal has been on the run since he jumped parole in March 2016 and, according to the police, he has been hiding in a prohibited area near the India-Pakistan border, surviving by doing petty jobs.

On August 9, 2012, Purkayastha, the daughter of IAS officers Atanu and Sumita Purkayastha – who were posted in Delhi at the time – was found dead in her flat in Wadala.The police had arrested Mughal, who worked as the watchman of the building where Purkayastha stayed, for his involvement in the crime. Mughal had fled from the building after Purkayastha was found dead. In his confession, Mughal told the police that he had killed Pallavi as she fought him when he tried to force himself on her.

Mughal is a native of Salamabad in Baramulla District. He was arrested from Gagangir village in Sonmarg where he had gone to work as labourer in highway construction project.

According to the police, Mughal took up several temporary jobs and was garnering sympathy and support from villagers as he had told them that he had been falsely implicated in the case by the police. This sympathy from villagers made it easy for him to hide, and difficult for police to nab him, the cops claimed.

"In August 2016, a team was formed to track Mughal's movement and it visited J&K at least four times to develop human intelligence on Mughal. On Tuesday morning, the accused was finally nabbed and brought to Mumbai same day. We will hand him over to Nashik Police as the case was registered by them after he jumped parole," said Datta Padsalgikar, Commissioner of Police, Mumbai.

The team, led by inspector Sanjay Nikam, had been living in J&K for a week and nabbed Mughal through an undercover operation. "Mughal was hiding in a village that neighbouring his, and since it is a prohibited area, it was difficult for us carry out any operation. His village is 16 kilometres from the India-Pakistan border and it was impossible for us to arrest him. Mughal had also changed his identity, names and appearance. He would introduced himself as Sajid, Salim or Sahil," Nikam said.

Another officer said, "We posed as Kashmiris so that we would not face opposition from locals. We developed our local sources and were keeping a watch on him. We were waiting for him to come out of the prohibited area to arrest him. Apart from J&K, he also attempted to work in Maharashtra under another identity, before fleeing to his village."