In a jaw-dropping turn of events, a Karnataka man locked up for nearly one-and-a-half years on charges of murdering his wife, Mallige, was vindicated when she strolled into a Mysuru court yesterday—very much alive!
Suresh, 38, from Kushalnagar in Kodagu district, had been behind bars since 2021, accused of killing his wife after she vanished in December 2020. Now, the Fifth Additional District and Sessions Court has ordered the Superintendent of Police (SP) to deliver a full report by April 17, slamming police for a botched investigation that’s left more questions than answers.
It all started when Suresh reported Mallige missing four years ago. Months later, police stumbled on a woman’s skeleton in Bettadarapura, Periyapatna taluk, and pinned it on him, claiming he’d murdered her over an alleged affair. They filed a charge sheet—before a DNA test even came back—and tossed him in jail.
The test later showed the bones weren’t Mallige’s, but the court initially brushed off his discharge plea, dragging the case on with witness testimonies. Then, on April 1, 2025, a friend of Suresh spotted Mallige dining with another man at a Madikeri hotel, just 25-30 km from where she’d supposedly “died.”
Suresh’s advocate, Pandu Poojari, pounced. “The police rushed a false charge sheet without evidence,” he told reporters. “Mallige was produced in court Thursday after we filed an advancement application. She admitted she’d eloped and remarried, clueless about Suresh’s ordeal.” Living in Shettyhalli village, she’d slipped through police fingers entirely. The court grilled Kushalnagar and Bettadarapura cops, who doubled down on their shaky story, but had no answers when Mallige stood before them.
Now, the spotlight’s on two mysteries: whose skeleton was it, and why did police frame Suresh? “This is rare and serious,” Poojari said. “The SP’s got till April 17 to explain these lapses before Suresh is declared innocent.” He’s gearing up for a High Court writ petition, seeking compensation for Suresh—a poor ST community member—and probes by the Human Rights and ST Commissions. For Suresh, it’s freedom after a nightmare; for Karnataka police, it’s a reckoning.