“If she had told us she didn’t want to marry Ketan, why would we have spent so much on wedding shopping?” Pooja Goyal asked reporters in Pune this week. Her daughter, Siya Goyal, is in custody, accused by police of helping to kill her fiancé, Ketan Agarwal, at Lohagad Fort.
Pooja Goyal said the family had put nearly Rs 50,000 into shopping for a planned pre-wedding trip to Bali. To her, that money was proof. A girl who dreaded the marriage, she argued, would not have let preparations roll on.
A family that saw no trouble
Speaking to India Today TV, the parents described an ordinary engagement. The couple video-called each other, met regularly and seemed happy. Ketan had even come to their home for dinner. “We never got any indication that something was wrong,” the mother said.
She said the family had asked Siya at least ten times whether she liked Ketan before the match was fixed. Each time, by her account, the answer was yes. The engagement ceremony followed in February.
The Goyals also pushed back on a claim by Ketan’s father that they had hidden facts. Praveen Goyal said the family knew nothing of any problem in the relationship, or of the alleged affair with another man. He had never met Chetan Chaudhary, he said, and never spoken to him. The mother acknowledged that Siya and Chaudhary knew each other from a cricket tournament, but said the family saw only a friendship.
A father’s blunt answer
Praveen Goyal said the arrest of his daughter was such a shock that he ended up in the intensive care unit. “I still find it impossible to believe my daughter could do something like this,” he said. “She never lied to me and always followed the right path.”
Then he said the other thing. If the allegations are proved, the court should not delay, and she should get the same punishment. Speaking separately to reporters, he went further and said that if she were found guilty, she should be pushed from the fort, just as Ketan was. He added that Ketan had been like a son to him.
Pooja Goyal made the same demand on Thursday, her first public comments since the arrests. She told reporters that if her daughter were found guilty, she should be thrown from the same place.
What police allege
The family’s account sits against a very different one from Pune Rural Police. Investigators say Ketan, 26, was pushed into a gorge at Lohagad Fort on June 18, in a plot hatched by Siya and Chaudhary. They say a first try on June 14 failed after Siya raised an alarm about a snake. Police gave the motive as shame: she did not want to call off the engagement, and so, they allege, chose another route.
The Times of India reported that police say the two met at a Diwali party last year and stayed in close contact for months. Call records, according to the paper, show more than 2,000 calls between January and June, adding up to 238 hours of conversation. Siya and Chaudhary were arrested on June 23, and at the time of the parents’ remarks they were in police custody until June 29.
Siya’s mother offered her own version of the day before the trek. She said Siya and Ketan had a video call about going to Lohagad, that Siya said she did not want to go, and that Ketan’s mother urged her to join. The mother said chats on her daughter’s phone would support this. Ketan’s uncle, Vijay Agarwal, told reporters the family was waiting for justice and had full faith in the legal process.
The investigation is still going on.
Sources
- Expressway Stop, Argument With Brother: Cab Driver Recalls Siya Goyal's Actions Before Bali Trip | India News – News18
- Lohagad Fort murder: Siya Goyal tore fiancé Ketan Agarwal’s passport after lover opposed pre-wedding Bali trip | Pune News – The Times of India
- I like Ketan, want to marry him: What Siya told parents before wedding was fixed – India Today
- Throw her from same fort: Siya Goyal mother demands harshest punishment if daughter is guilty – The Times of India
