He buried the body  during a  plot at Kaveripakkam in Ranipet. His father was 78-year-old man, reported missing from his home at Valasaravakkam, later it came to be known that he was murdered by his son, who took the body to  Kaveripakkam in Ranipet district and buried it in a plot that he hoped to buy, to destroy the evidence of his crime, the police said.

T. Kumaresan, 78, retired from a Central government establishment and was living in a  residential building belonging to him at Thandavamoorthy Nagar, Arcot Road. His wife died in 2019. The couple had three daughters and a son.  one among his daughters, Kanchana Mala, 55, has been living within the same building on the second floor after the demise of her husband with his son, son of deceased has been staying together with his family on the first floor.

Kanchana Mala visited her in-laws at Mandaveli last Sunday and returned home on Thursday.  because the house was locked and her father’s mobile phone was unreachable, she called up her brother. He claimed that he didn’t know about his father and joined her in searching for him in the nearby area.

After some time, Gunasekeran went missing and his  mobile was out of reach. Kanchana Mala became suspicious of this circumstance. With the help of relatives, she broke open the door of the house from where a nasty odour emanated and bloodstains were found on the floor.

Valasaravakkam  cops reached the spot following her alert. Forensic experts collected samples and a sniffer dog was deployed.

The interrogation with Gunasekaran’s wife Vasanthi revealed that he had gone to satisfy a friend, Venkatesan, at Kaveripakkam on Wednesday morning to seem for a piece of land to set up a unit to sell tiles.  the subsequent day, Gunasekaran drove a mini-van with a closed drum and a shovel to the plot that he proposed to shop for. He asked his friend to go away, saying he had some work to try to do on the ground.

With  the assistance  of a local worker, a pit was dug. He buried the body, which was in pieces,  within the  pit and returned to the city. He allegedly told a tenant that he had performed a special pooja to  keep off  evil and for the improvement of his business and was carrying the materials in the van to be buried in the plot he would buy soon, police sources said.

On his return from Kaveripakkam, he pretended to be looking for his father and then escaped. He and his father had a dispute over the sharing of property  together with his  sister,  which  might have been the reason for the extreme act, said the police.

Further investigation is on to trace the accused and ensure the motive.