‘Auto’ Shankar and a series of bizarre murders in Chennai Premium

In all six murders, the victims were helpless. The murders were cruel in execution by ‘Auto’ Shankar and his men, who eliminated those who were a hindrance to their illegal business

Auto Shankar who was flown from Calcutta to Madras being brought to the office of the Director Genral of Police in Madras on September 4, 1990. | Photo Credit: The Hindu Archives

No one realised the gravity of the crime until the police exhumed bodies at an under-construction house and its adjacent area, a narrow and long-winding pathway surrounded by a cluster of huts at Periyar Nagar off Thiruvanmiyur on July 7, 1988. One body after another came out, in a highly decomposed state, when the investigators dug up the soil. Periyar Nagar remained panic-stricken following the exhumation of the four bodies. and the police had a tough time in keeping at bay large crowds that had gathered on the scene.

The victims were identified as Sampath, Mohan, Govindaraj, and Ravi, who was an autorickshaw driver. All of them were aged 25-30 and from Mandaveli. Weeks earlier, the brother of Sampath had lodged a complaint with the Abhiramapuram police that his brother had gone missing since May 29. Only after Sampath’s wife pleaded with Governor P.C. Alexander to trace her missing husband, did the police start the probe with an autorickshaw driver, Shekar, in whose vehicle the three victims travelled to a lodge on Lattice Bridge Road  on May 29.

With vital clues given by the autorickshaw driver, the police on July 6 picked up Shankar, 33, of Periyar Nagar and his associates Babu and Jayavelu, who were said to be arrack-sellers and to have no criminal records. Shankar showed the spot where they had buried the bodies of three men five weeks ago and another one eight months ago. Then the cold-blooded murders committed by Shankar came to light.

Alarming turn

The case took an alarming turn on July 15, with the police exhuming another body, this one of a young woman, from a hut. That the body had been buried in the hut came to light following the arrest of Mohan, 30, younger brother of Shankar. In the 1970s and 1980s, Periyar Nagar was a cluster of slums set in the midst of squalid surroundings. It was notorious for the sale of illicit liquor and flesh trade.

Shankar was born in 1955 at Kangeyanallur in Vellore district. His father was from Kerala and mother was from Vellore. When he was doing PUC, his father left his mother for Orissa. At a young age, he came to the city and settled down at Periyar Nagar. He started out as an assistant to a mason and became a painter. Shankar later started driving autorickshaws, transporting illicit arrack. Then he got the nickname ‘Auto’. Subsequently he started selling illicit arrack. He married Jagadeeswari. His brother-in-law Eldin alias Albert, Shivaji, Jayavelu, Raman alias Raja Raman, and Ravi were helping him in the illegal business. He entrusted the illicit arrack business to his brother Mohan and started running prostitution.

Flesh trade

The police said Shankar would eliminate anybody who interfered with his criminal activities. According to the prosecution, six murdered persons had incurred his wrath and were beaten to death by Shankar and his associates. Shankar put up a shed on a poramboke land and was running a brothel.

In 1986, he developed intimacy with one Sumathi and married her. Jagadeeswari, the first wife, quarrelled with him over his second marriage. Two months later, he brought another girl, Vijaya, and she left him stealthily as he had tortured her physically. Subsequently, he had married two more girls, but they all left because of his ill-treatment.

From the money he made from prostitution, he constructed a house on Gandhi Road, Periyar Nagar, and celebrated the house-warming ceremony. Several politicians and police officers attended the ceremony.

The prosecution case was that Shankar was attracted to the beauty of one Lalitha, who was spotted in a cabaret. He brought her and set up a separate residence for her on Kalakshetra Road. She eloped with Sudalai, who was his close associate in prostitution. They ran away, taking ₹7,300 and a camera belonging to Shankar, who lodged a complaint with the police. He also searched for them in cities like Bangalore.

On his complaint, the police traced them at Pallavaram and brought them to Thiruvanmiyur. As she refused to live with Shankar, the police sent her to Bangalore, escorted by a constable. But Shankar took custody of her. Angered by her betrayal, Shankar strangled her on October 28, 1987. He took her golden anklets, studs, and necklace, which he had given her. He buried the body near a liquor godown. This was the first murder committed by Shankar and his gang.

Shankar took Sudalai in a car to an arrack shop on February 28, 1988. At his house, Shankar gave him brandy and smothered Sudalai to death and set fire to the body after dousing it in petrol. Later, he and his associates bundled the body in a bed-sheet, carried it in a car, and threw it in the backwaters below the Muttukadu bridge at 2 a.m. the next morning.

Ravi, an autorickshaw driver, repeatedly enquired with Shankar about the whereabouts of Lalitha and Sudalai and blackmailed him while they were consuming liquor. He demanded ₹2 lakh from Shankar, who along with his associates strangled him to death at 9 p.m. on March 14, 1988. With the help of a mason and a painter, they dug a pit near the bathroom of the house and buried the body.

Sampath, Mohan, and Govindaraj used to visit Taj Mahal Hotel, where sex-workers from Shankar’s brothel used to entertain customers, and create nuisance. At 4 p.m. on May 29, 1988, they were coming in an autorickshaw and saw one Anitha, near Shankar’s brothel. They caught hold of her and forced her to go with them. Shankar and his associates beat up the trio with casuarina sticks and wooden reapers. The trio were confined to a storeroom at Ranganathapuram. Later, they found two of them dead and the third one groaning. They murdered the third person brutally. They buried the three bodies in trenches dug for laying the foundation of a building.

Devendra Babu, alias Babu, an associate of Shankar, was arrested on July 6, 1988. Based on his confession, Shankar was arrested at midnight of July 7, 1988. The investigation was handled by the CB-CID from July 17. In all, 10 persons, including Shankar and his associates, were arrested and 16 police personnel, including a DSP, two sub-inspectors, and two inspectors, were suspended for being lax in the investigation into the disappearance of the deceased persons.

On December 26, 1988, the CB-CID filed a charge sheet in the court of the Judicial Second Class Magistrate, Saidapet, against Shankar and nine others for murdering six persons. They were charged under Sections 120-B (conspiracy). 147 (unlawful assembly), 148 (armed with deadly weapons) 364 (abduction), 302 (murder) and 201 (concealing evidence) IPC.

In August 1990, Shankar, and his associates Mohan, 28, and Selvaraj, 30, and two other accused persons escaped from the Madras Central Prison by scaling the wall with the connivance of prison employees. He befriended a woman who frequently visited her husband in the prison and ran away with her to Rourkela in Orissa. The daring escape sent shock waves in the city. Thirteen members of the jail staff, including the Superintendent of the Central Prison, were placed under suspension. Weeks later, a police team traced Shankar and Devi to a hut at Tangrapalli near Rourkela.

The police brought him back by scheduled flights after obtaining special permission from the Bureau of Civil Aviation. He was shifted to the Central Prison, Salem. The trial began on December 6, 1990, at the District Sessions Court at Chengalpattu. On May 31, 1991, judge N. Mohandas sentenced Gowri Shankar, alias ‘Auto’ Shankar, 33, Eldin, alias Albert, 30, and Shivaji, 30, to death. He awarded life imprisonment to Jayavelu, Raman, Ravi, Palani, and Paramasivam.

On April 5, 1994, the Supreme Court confirmed the death sentence and Shankar was hanged on April 27, 1995, at the Salem Central Prison.