Former Army Man Accused of Killing Wife, Attacking Son Found Dead in Pune, Police Suspect Suicide

Pune, September 3, 2026 — A former Army serviceman accused of killing his wife and trying to murder his teenage son was found hanging from a tree near the Bhima river in Pune district’s Khed taluka on Wednesday, in what police have described as a suspected suicide. The death came days after the same man was booked for allegedly strangling his wife at their Rajgurunagar home and attacking his son when the boy confronted him.

The accused, 45-year-old Mahendra Shivaji Daundkar, had retired from the Army in 2019 and was later employed as a security guard with a private company in Vishrantwadi. Police said his body was discovered in Chandoli village, near the Bhima river, and that an initial inquiry pointed to suicide. An accidental-death case has been registered, while the investigation continues.

The criminal case against Daundkar stems from events on the night of Sunday, August 30, at the family’s residence in Sangam Garden on Wada Road in Rajgurunagar, Khed. According to police, his wife, Deepa Mahendra Daundkar, 40, was found with injury marks on her neck and was unresponsive when family members reached her. She was first taken to a hospital in Khed and then shifted to a government hospital in Chakan, where doctors declared her dead.

The complaint in the case was filed by the couple’s 17-year-old son, Atharva, who told police that he had gone to a friend’s house in the same building at around 9.30 p.m. Around 11.35 p.m., the friend’s mother received a missed call from Deepa. Atharva returned home immediately after that call.

According to the complaint, Daundkar opened the door and told his son not to disturb his mother, saying she had taken a tablet and gone to sleep. When Atharva went into the bedroom, he found Deepa lying motionless. He noticed that her body was cold, her face had turned dark and bluish, and there were marks on her neck.

Police said the situation escalated when the teenager questioned his father. Daundkar allegedly locked the bedroom door and tried to strangle Atharva with a cloth or dupatta. The boy managed to push him away, open the door and raise an alarm. During the struggle, Daundkar is also alleged to have picked up two kitchen knives and threatened to stab his son if he continued shouting. Atharva suffered an injury to his right thumb in the confrontation.

Relatives living in the same building rushed to the house after hearing the commotion. Police said Daundkar then pushed his elderly father-in-law before fleeing towards the fields.

Based on Atharva’s complaint, Khed police registered a case under Sections 103 (murder), 109 (attempt to murder) and 352 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and began searching for the accused. The body of Daundkar was found during search operations on Wednesday morning.

Investigators said Daundkar and his wife had been quarrelling frequently over her strained relations with his sister. Police added that he had left home earlier, on March 22, over the same issue, after which Deepa had filed a missing-person complaint. According to officers, the same family dispute is believed to have triggered the August 30 incident as well.

With Daundkar now dead, police have kept both the murder and attempt-to-murder case on record while continuing their inquiry into the circumstances surrounding his death and the sequence of events leading up to the alleged crime.