Sahil had gone missing on February 3 after his tuition. His father Ankush Dalvi and his family had initially put up posters of the child in the city. However, after receiving a ransom call for Rs 15 lakh the day after he went missing, they approached the MIDC police who registered a case of kidnapping. The family received another call a few days later from another man who seemed to be drunk. The first call was traced to an unattended PCO while the second caller was detained and let off as a prank caller.

Local newspapers in Satara had reported the incident and Dalvi’s relatives who stayed in the area contacted his parents after they read the reports.

“The Satara police found Sahil’s badly decomposed body in a resin bag in Karad, Satara district near a river,” said DCP KMM Prasanna of Zone X. “From our enquiries we found out that the day the boy went missing he had been slapped by Dalvi after he made a mistake in his homework. The boy then went for his tuition where he related the incident to his teacher. After his tuition, Sahil went missing. Initially his parents did not file a complaint but on the next night when some one called and demanded a ransom of Rs 15 lakh they approached us,” he added. Prasanna added, “We had made five teams to search for him. Initially we were trying to see if he had actually been kidnapped or if he had just run away. We checked out all the places he could have gone keeping in mind that he was just seven years old. After this we checked all the railway stations and hospitals to see if he turned up there.”

According to NC Sarkar, the boy’s tuition teacher and the last person to see him, “Sahil was a very sweet and lively boy. Whenever he would get anything new he would show it to us and get very excited. He was also very good in studies especially Maths.”