As Anurag Kashyap's Raman Raghav 2.0 starring Nawazuddin Siddiqui released on Friday, India's most prolific serial killer Raman Raghav is back in news.

Kashyap's movie is based on the story of Raman, a serial killer, who preyed on the streets of Mumbai in mid-1960s.

Also Read: Inside the mind of serial killer and rapist





THE CHICKEN CURRY CONFESSION



Raman Raghav is known to have killed at least 40 people in a span of three years and there is no pattern or clue to how he picked his victims. But most of his victims were slum dwellers.

Raman had also raped and killed his sister.

When he was kept in custody, nothing made him give in to the police's interrogation except chicken curry. After having his wish fulfilled of eating chicken curry, oddly, he gave all the details.

Raman was kept under psychiatric evaluation and was declared "not certifiably insane". He was sentenced to death by an additional sessions judge in Mumbai.

Source: Alchetron Source: Alchetron

Now, let us introduce you to eight other serial killers who shook India.



1. Nithari

The revelation of Nithari killings scared the entire Delhi-Noida belt. With accusations of rape, cannibalism, paedophilia, sodomy and organ trafficking, this macabre case received massive attention from the media, and households across Noida were shocked.

In 2006, Moninder Singh Pandher, a businessman from Noida, and his domestic help Surinder Koli were arrested in connection with the discovery of skulls of missing children in Nithari village.

Surinder Koli, domestic help of Moninder Singh Pandher Surinder Koli, domestic help of Moninder Singh Pandher

Surinder Koli was found guilty of five homicides but his death sentence in January 2015 was commuted to life imprisonment by the Allahabad high court on the ground of "inordinate delay" in deciding his mercy petition.

However, Pandher spent seven years in prison and walked out of the Dasna jail in Ghaziabad in September, 2014. Allahabad High Court granted him bail in August in five of the pending cases against him. He still has five cases against him with the Central Bureau of Investigation.

2. Auto Shankar

In 1988, nine girls from Chennai's Thiruvanmiyur went missing in a span of six months.

A schoolgirl named Subalakshmi complained that an auto-rickshaw driver tried to abduct her in front of a local wine shop. To crack this case of serial abduction, the police went undercover and worked in the wine shop.

It was found that a man named Gowri Shankar was behind this.

Shankar kidnapped girls, killed them, cremated the bodies and dropped their ashes in the Bay of Bengal. Shankar and two of his aides, Eldin and Shivaji, were hanged to death on May 31, 1991.

Source: s5.postimg.org Source: s5.postimg.org

3. Charles Sobhraj - the Bikini Killer



Randeep Hooda's 'Main Aur Charles' was based on the story of this infamous serial killer who is also known as 'The Serpent'.

Sobhraj's victims were between the age of 12 and 24, mostly western tourists. He used to win their confidence before drugging and killing them.

Dutch students Henk Bintanja, and his fiancee Cornelia Hemker, met Sobhraj in Hong Kong and were invited to Thailand where he poisoned them but nurtured them back to health just to gain their trust.

Sobhraj was named the 'Bikini Killer' because many of his victims were found drowned wearing a swimsuit. Charles is currently serving a sentence in Nepal.



Source: Reuters Source: Reuters



4. Cyanide attack

In a span of 5 years, Mohan Kumar, a primary school science teacher, killed 20 women. His targets were mostly women from middle or lower-income backgrounds and bus stops were his favourite spot to befriend them.

His plan of action included marriage, elopement and running away with their money and jewellery after killing them. Seeking no dowry, he lured women to elope with him to faraway towns where he would have sex with them a night before the so-called wedding and give them cyanide in the form of birth control pills.

He was sentenced to death in December 2013.



5. Devendra Sharma

This ayurvedic doctor had something against taxi drivers because he has killed 20 of them.

Posing as a tourist, Sharma would hire a cab and upon reaching a predetermined location, he would let his accomplices enter the vehicle. Devendra, along with his gang, would then take the driver to a secluded place where the driver would be beaten to death.

The driver's vehicle would be sold and the major share of the sale always went to Sharma. He was arrested in 2004 and given death sentence in 2008.

Source: murderpedia.org Source: murderpedia.org

6. Renuka Shinde and her sister Seema Gavit- The Killer Sisters

Trained to steal since childhood by their own mother, these half-sisters used children to save themselves from any accusations in case they got caught.

They kidnapped young children and out of the kidnapped, kids creating problems were killed. From 1990 to 1996, they killed over six kids.

Source: murderpedia.org Source: murderpedia.org



Charged with kidnapping of 13 children and murder of 10 of them, the Supreme Court convicted the sisters in 2006. President Pranab Mukherjee rejected their mercy petition and the sisters will be the first women to be hanged in India.



7. India's first serial killer- Mallika

Serial killer Mallika chose her victims from among female devotees near temples where she acted like an extremely religious person and befriended well-to-do women.

After gaining their confidence, she would advise them to visit a faraway temple with her. Mallika also asked them to dress up in gold and everything fancy.

When the woman reached the temple, Mallika would pretend to perform a prayer and then would ask the woman to drink the 'holy water' or eat 'prasad' which would be laced with cyanide.

She killed six women using this plan and was given death penalty in 2010. Her death penalty was reduced to life imprisonment in 2012.

Source: post.jagarn Source: post.jagarn

8. Paedophile Ravinder Kumar

This 24-year-old man was arrested on charges of raping and killing children.

Arrested for killing and sexually assaulting at least 15 children since 2008, Kumar committed his first crime at the age of 19. He confessed that he was addicted to alcohol and drugs.

Ravinder often targeted poor children sleeping on the streets. He would carry them to crematorium grounds where he raped and killed them.

Six of his victims did not belong to Delhi.





Also Read: Who was Raman Raghav?

And this: How the world's first serial killer was raped to death by a giraffe as a punishment

