Nellai engineer wanted to become a film director

The police suspect that his so-called ambition could have led to his heinous crime. “He was an introvert and we suspect that he was a borderline psychopath,” said a police officer who was part of the investigation team. 

A mechanical engineer who completed the course from Einstein College of Engineering at Alamkulam in Tirunelveli with five arrears, Ramkumar came to Chennai after telling his parents that he needed to clear his arrear papers. However, he worked in a textile shop instead. While it’s not clear how he met/saw Swathi, some sources say he ‘friended’ her on Facebook. However, this has not been established. Police sources believe that Ramkumar saw Swathi only after renting a room at the mansion at Sourashtra Nagar, opposite her house in Gangai Amman Koil Street, Choolaimedu. 

“He started stalking her, and followed her when she went to the office and came back. He had travelled with her on the train to Paranur and back. However, we are still not clear why he decided to murder her,” the official added. 

On Friday morning, after hacking Swathi to death with machete, Ramkumar ran to the end of the Platform No. 2, crossed the track, threw away the weapon, scaled down the wall and calmly walked back to his room at AS Mansion. It was later learnt that the weapon that was used to murder Swathi belonged to his relative Thangavelu, who had been searching the sickle for more than 20 days. 

The police found the evidence they had been looking for when a security guard at AS Mansion identified him. On searching his room, the police found a blood-stained greenchecked shirt, the one that was seen in the CCTV footage. His roommate said Ramkumar was a silent person and barely spoke to anyone.

When the police picked him up from his house at Meenatchipuram Village near Senkottai, he was sleeping with a sickle by his side. On seeing the police, he grabbed the sickle and tried to cut his throat. 

Highly placed police sources said that he had informed his parents about the crime he committed. “He stayed inside his house for the last six days and did not go out,” a senior police official said. His father Paramasivam is said to be a BSNL employee at Tenkasi. He has an elder sister Madhubala (27) and younger sister Kaleeshwari (20). His family claimed that they were not aware of the murder and they were seen crying and hiding their faces when the police came.