Biryani, secret marriage, divorce, murder: Twists and turns in Bengaluru child death; mother untraceable, her lover held

Bengaluru: Two months after six-year-old Vennela was found dead under suspicious circumstances, Kadugodi police have launched a murder investigation into the case.

The child's mother, advocate P Priyanka, and her friend Mohan G Mahalingappa, a real estate developer, have been booked for murder. Mohan has been remanded to seven-day police custody, while Priyanka remains untraceable.

The case follows a complaint filed by the girl's father, Praveen Basappa, founder and teacher in an international school in Davanagere.

According to police, the suspected sequence of events began on the night of March 24, Priyanka's birthday. She told her family that she fed Vennela biryani and ice cream and left her to sleep in the car with the air conditioning on while she went to a coffee shop with Mohan.

On returning home, Priyanka carried her sleeping daughter to bed. The following morning, Vennela did not wake up. She was rushed to Vydehi Hospital in Whitefield, where doctors declared her brought dead.

Initially, police suspected the child may have died due to food poisoning and registered the case as an unnatural death. However, after the autopsy report proved inconclusive and investigators noticed inconsistencies in Priyanka's version of events, police sent viscera samples to the forensic science laboratory.

They also grew suspicious after Mohan applied for anticipatory bail soon after the incident. The girl's father alleged that they killed her to be together.

Meanwhile, Praveen shared the autopsy report with his sister, a child specialist based in England, who said she suspected foul play.

Praveen then approached police accusing Priyanka and Mohan of murdering the child because she allegedly “stood in the way” of their new life together. In his complaint, Praveen alleged his daughter was kicked in the stomach and smothered before being taken to hospital.

Praveen told police that cracks began to appear in his 17-year marriage to Priyanka in 2025 after she travelled to Bengaluru for a case. During the visit, she reportedly reconnected with her former college mate, Mohan, a real estate developer who claimed to manage assets worth nearly Rs 1,000 crore.

He claimed the two secretly married in Dec 2025 and travelled to Dubai for New Year celebrations. Following the separation, the couple’s elder daughter stayed with Praveen, while six-year-old Vennela lived with Priyanka and Mohan in a rented villa at Seegehalli.

Praveen claims he signed the divorce papers as Priyanka threatened to cut off access to the daughters.

Deputy commissioner of police (Whitefield) Saidulu Adavat told TOI that when Mohan got anticipatory bail they did not yet have the complete autopsy report of the case.

He pointed out that investigators relied on circumstantial and medical evidence to approach the court, following which Mohan’s anticipatory bail was cancelled Friday.

Police have now converted the case into a homicide investigation and are probing whether the child was left to suffocate in the car or poisoned before being left in the vehicle.