Indore (Madhya Pradesh): On the morning of May 16, a mobile number silently came to life in Indore. The same day, Sonam Raghuvanshi booked a honeymoon trip to Meghalaya with her husband, Raja Raghuvanshi. What seemed like the beginning of a romantic getaway ended in a murder that sent shockwaves across the country.
Eight days later, on May 24, the mobile number was switched off in Bihar. That was just one day after Raja was found dead in Shillong.
What connected the dots for the Shillong police was this very SIM card — a digital ghost trail that led them straight to the alleged killers. Sonam was in constant touch with this mobile number till May 24.
Suspicious of her call records, Investigators in Shillong alerted their Indore counterpart. And, the hunt began. As pressure mounted police of both states was running against time to crack the case.
Soon, a man named Raj Kushwaha was picked up. He cracked under questioning thus spilling the beans. Raj, it was found, had acted as a key link between Sonam and the murderers. His confession led to the arrest of two from Indore, one from Bina and another from Lalitpur.
Chilling revelation
The SIM card was deliberately bought from Indore to stay under the radar — far from the crime scene — and to build a channel of secret communication that wouldn’t raise any suspicion.
According to police, the accused fled to Bihar immediately after Raja’s murder, thinking the silence of a switched-off phone would bury their crime. But it was this very silence that roared the loudest in the investigation.
Juice Before Justice
A fresh twist emerged in the honeymoon murder case when a woman from Varanasi called Raja’s brother Vipin Raghuwanshi with a startling claim: she had seen Sonam, days before her surrender in Ghazipur, sharing juice with two men at the Varanasi bus stand.
“She looked cheerful, dressed in black,” the caller said. “The men dropped her off on a bus to Ghazipur. She may have gotten down at Nandganj.” The woman, in Varanasi for a relative’s last rites, believes Sonam wasn’t fleeing — she was being escorted.
Now, Raja’s family wants police to scan CCTV footage to identify the two men and verify the claim — adding yet another layer to this unfolding mystery.
