Top 10 Indian Crime Stories You Won’t Believe Are True
Above image credit: newslaundry_2025-03-27_kwo6brv4_police-brutality-event
India’s crime history is often reduced to headlines — murders, scams, riots, and statistics that vanish as quickly as they appear. But beneath those surface stories lie darker, stranger cases that reveal something far more unsettling: crimes driven by belief, obsession, corruption, social pressure, and psychological collapse.
This collection brings together ten of India’s most disturbing and unusual crime stories — cases that span decades, regions, and motives. From cult-like family deaths in Delhi to serial killers hiding behind respectability, from online panic to underworld violence, these are not just crimes of brutality, but of influence and environment.
Each story stands alone, yet together they form a portrait of how crime in India often emerges not from a single moment of violence, but from systems that fail, silence that protects, and beliefs that go unchallenged. These are cases where killers weren’t always monsters — and victims weren’t always random.
Some were solved. Others remain clouded by doubt. All of them left scars.
This is not a list of the “worst” crimes by any means — but some of the most revealing ones.
1. The Great Bridge Heist — Bihar, 2022
It sounds like satire, but it wasn’t. In April 2022, villagers in Rohtas district, Bihar, awoke to find that an entire 60-foot iron bridge—spanning the Ara canal—had vanished. Not a plank, not a railing. Gone.
The thieves had executed the plan with astonishing precision. For days, they posed as irrigation department officials, complete with forged documents and uniforms. Under the pretense of “dismantling an old structure,” they brought in gas cutters, cranes, and trucks. Locals even helped, assuming it was an official job. By the time the real authorities arrived, every piece of iron had been stripped, loaded, and sold as scrap.
2. The TikTok Fame Killing — Delhi, 2020
TikTok was meant to be harmless entertainment. But for 23-year-old Mohit Mor, a rising social media star from Delhi, online fame became a death sentence.
In May 2020, Mor’s growing popularity—millions of followers and brand offers—sparked jealousy among acquaintances who saw his rapid success as betrayal. On a quiet afternoon, he was gunned down inside a friend’s shop in Najafgarh by three masked men. The killers had tracked his social media posts to pinpoint his location.
Investigators discovered the hit was ordered over rivalry within a circle of local influencers and gang associates. Behind the glamour of viral fame lay a darker truth—ego, envy, and territory wars spilling from digital screens into real bloodshed.
📍 No Publicly Reported Sentencing Yet
There have been arrests connected to the murder of Mohit Mor — including:
A juvenile arrested soon after the killing in 2019
Two alleged gang members, Vikas and Rohit Dagar, were arrested by Delhi Police in 2020 in connection with the murder.
However, there are no clear, credible reports in major Indian news sources confirming that any of these individuals have been formally convicted and sentenced in court for Mohit Mor’s murder. Media coverage focuses on arrests and investigation developments, but no public record of a trial verdict or sentencing has been widely reported. Public news outlets have not published confirmed sentencing outcomes as of the available information.
📌 Why This Happens
Criminal cases in India — especially involving gang-related murder — can take several years to go to trial and reach sentencing.
Arrests alone do not guarantee that a conviction or sentence has been reached or reported publicly.
3. The Assam Witch Hunt Killings — Assam, 2010s
In the misty, forested corners of Assam, superstition still carries lethal weight. Between 2011 and 2019, over 100 people—mostly women—were tortured and killed after being branded witches.
One of the most chilling cases occurred in 2013, when a 63-year-old woman and her two sons were dragged from their home in Kokrajhar and hacked to death by neighbors who accused them of black magic. Their “crime”? The mysterious illness of a villager. Police arrived too late.
Despite decades of education campaigns, witch-hunting persists in parts of Assam, Jharkhand, and Odisha, fueled by fear, greed, and social divisions. Politicians have passed laws, NGOs have protested—but each monsoon seems to bring another killing.
It is a reminder that in modern India, ancient terrors still live quietly beneath the surface—waiting for the next unlucky scapegoat.
4. The Asaram Bapu Scandal — Gujarat & Rajasthan, 2013
Image Credit: PTII
In 2013, a 16-year-old girl accused the guru of sexual assault at his ashram near Jodhpur. The case shattered India’s faith in its self-proclaimed spiritual elite. As investigators dug deeper, more survivors came forward, alleging decades of abuse and intimidation masked as divine “discipline.”
Asaram was arrested after a nationwide manhunt and later sentenced to life in prison. His empire—once worth billions—crumbled under the weight of his hypocrisy. Yet his devotees remained divided, with some still defending his “divinity.”
The scandal marked a turning point in India’s reckoning with fake godmen—charlatans who preached purity while committing crimes in the shadows of incense and prayer.
Current Status (2025)
A Trail of Violence and Witness Silencing
The legal proceedings were overshadowed by a consistent pattern of coercion and brutality. Since 2013, the cases have been linked to the targeting of at least nine key witnesses. This wave of intimidation resulted in three murders, while several other individuals vanished under suspicious circumstances, casting a long shadow over the pursuit of justice.
Medical Relief and Bail
Despite serving multiple life sentences, the judicial system has recently granted several reprieves based on the convict’s declining physical health:
Supreme Court Intervention (January 2025): The Supreme Court issued an interim bail order effective through March 31, 2025, specifically to allow for urgent medical care.
Gujarat High Court Ruling (November 2025): Most recently, the Gujarat High Court approved a six-month suspension of his sentence. This ruling permits him to leave Rajasthan to pursue specialized medical treatment.
Ongoing Incarceration
During the periods when medical bail is not active, he remains incarcerated at the Jodhpur Central Jail, where he has served the bulk of his life sentences.
5. The Harshad Mehta Scam — Mumbai, 1992
He was the “Big Bull” of Dalal Street—a charismatic stockbroker who turned the Indian stock market into his personal casino. Harshad Mehta rose from a modest background to dominate the financial world in the early 1990s.
But his empire was built on fraud. Mehta exploited loopholes in the banking system, siphoning thousands of crores through fake securities and manipulating stock prices with reckless abandon. His schemes inflated the market until it inevitably burst, wiping out fortunes overnight.
When journalist Sucheta Dalal exposed the scam, India’s financial system shook to its core. Mehta was arrested and eventually died in custody in 2001, leaving behind a legacy of greed and hubris.
The Harshad Mehta scandal wasn’t just a financial crime—it was a morality play about ambition, trust, and the seductive illusion of success.
Absolutely — here are the remaining five India-related crime stories, each written at roughly 250 words, in the same narrative, immersive true-crime tone as the first batch. All are factual, carefully framed, and ready to drop straight into your blog.
6. The Burari Deaths — Delhi, 2018
On a quiet July morning in Delhi’s Burari neighborhood, police entered a modest three-storey home and encountered a scene that defied comprehension. Eleven members of the Chundawat family were dead. Ten bodies hung from the ceiling, blindfolded and gagged, arranged in eerie symmetry. An elderly matriarch lay strangled in another room.
There were no signs of struggle. No forced entry. No suicide note. Instead, investigators found notebooks—meticulously handwritten—detailing rituals, timings, and instructions. The family, it seemed, believed they were participating in a spiritual ceremony that would bring salvation and protection. The patriarch’s deceased father, they wrote, was guiding them from beyond the grave.
Psychologists later described the deaths as a case of “shared psychosis,” where delusion spreads within a tightly controlled family unit. Yet many questions remain unanswered. Why did no one resist? Why were neighbors unaware? Why were the instructions followed so precisely?
The Burari deaths horrified India not because of violence, but because of obedience. Eleven lives lost not to hatred or greed, but to blind faith and psychological captivity. The house still stands — sealed, silent, and infamous — a chilling reminder of how belief can quietly turn fatal.
7. The Scarlett Keeling Case — Goa, 2008
The British teenager had attended a Valentine’s Day beach party the night before. When her body was found, she bore dozens of cuts and bruises, signs of blunt force trauma, and evidence of sexual assault. Toxicology reports later revealed a cocktail of drugs in her system, including ecstasy, cocaine, and LSD. Her mother, Fiona Mackeown, refused to accept the initial police explanation and pushed relentlessly for a deeper investigation.
What followed was a case marred by investigative failures, public outrage, and years of legal twists. Two local men, Samson D’Souza and Placido Carvalho, were charged after the Central Bureau of Investigation took over. In 2012, both were controversially acquitted by a trial court, a decision that sparked international criticism.
Seven years later, justice took a different turn. In 2019, the Bombay High Court’s Goa bench overturned the acquittal of Samson D’Souza, convicting him on multiple charges related to administering drugs and sexual assault. He was sentenced to ten years of rigorous imprisonment and ordered to pay compensation to Scarlett’s mother. Carvalho’s acquittal was upheld due to lack of evidence.
Scarlett Keeling’s death exposed the underbelly of Goa’s party scene and remains a stark reminder of how quickly paradise can turn lethal — and how fiercely justice sometimes must be fought for.
8. The Cyanide Killer — Mohan Kumar, Karnataka, 2003–2009
Kumar preyed on vulnerable women — divorcees, widows, and those seeking companionship. He promised marriage, courted them at temples, and on the day of supposed engagement, offered them a “sacred” pill. It was cyanide.
Many victims were found dead in temple bathrooms, initially mistaken for suicides. The pattern only emerged years later when police noticed similarities across districts. Kumar eventually confessed to killing at least 20 women.
What made the case especially disturbing was the absence of rage or chaos. Kumar killed quietly, efficiently, and without remorse. His motive appeared to be sexual gratification, power, and the thrill of deception. In 2017, he was sentenced to death.
The Cyanide Killer remains a grim study in trust betrayed — a reminder that predators often hide behind the most ordinary faces.
9. Auto Shankar — Tamil Nadu, 1980s
Gowri Shankar, better known as Auto Shankar, ruled the underbelly of Chennai with violence and impunity. A former auto-rickshaw driver, he became a feared serial killer, targeting sex workers and those who crossed his criminal network.
What made Auto Shankar especially dangerous was not just his brutality, but his protection. He operated with the backing of corrupt police officers and politicians, disposing of bodies in burial grounds and riverbanks. Victims vanished without investigation.
His reign ended only after his brother turned informant, revealing details too detailed to ignore. Shankar was arrested, tried, and executed in 1995.
The case exposed systemic rot — where criminals thrive not in hiding, but in plain sight, shielded by power. Auto Shankar wasn’t just a serial killer; he was a symptom of institutional failure.
10. The Blue Whale Suicide Challenge — India, 2017
It began as a rumor, then a panic, then a tragedy. The Blue Whale Challenge was an alleged online “game” that encouraged teenagers to complete escalating dares, ending in self-harm or suicide. In 2017, India reported multiple deaths linked — directly or indirectly — to the phenomenon.
Teenagers from Mumbai to Kerala were found dead after exhibiting behavioral changes, secretive phone use, and cryptic messages. Authorities scrambled to understand the threat. Social media platforms denied responsibility. Parents demanded answers.
A 19-year-old in Madurai was found dead with a carved whale image and “Blue Whale” on his arm; police said he was part of a WhatsApp group tied to the challenge.
Reports emerged of teen suicides or attempts in places like Mumbai, Kerala, and Bengal that authorities or families suspected were connected to Blue Whale.
Some young people were rescued or talked down from committing suicide after showing signs they were involved (including images of self-injury) and contacting authorities.
In one case a 22-year-old in Puducherry was stopped by police before completing the final stages.
These incidents triggered widespread concern among Indian parents, educators, and officials.
While some cases were later disputed, the fear was real. The challenge tapped into adolescent vulnerability, loneliness, and psychological distress. India temporarily banned several apps and launched awareness campaigns.
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Blog written by Guy Hadleigh, author of Crimes That Time Forgot, the Macabre True Crimes & Mysteries Series, the Murder and Mayhem Series, the British Killers Series, the Infamous True Crimes and Trials Series - and many more!
