The five initially tried to cover up by reportedly staging a drama in front of the police. After a six-hour interrogation, they gave their ``confessional statements''. The alleged mastermind of the crime -- a dog-handler named Satyendra Pandey who was retrenched a fortnight ago by the manager -- fled the spot with two of his unidentified outsider accomplices, the police said.

At about 8 am, farm-hand Vikram, told the Dhauj police post personnel of a robbery-bid on the farm and that around six sword-weilding men had tied up all the employees. He said that he had broken free and had seen the assailants entering the building where manager Prem Swaroop Ghai and his wife Madhu lived. He reporedly said that he suspected that the couple had been murdered. An FIR was registered and a police team was sent to the farm.

They found one of the employees, Jeevan, with his hands bound. A further search led to the recovery of the bodies in a store-cum-laboratory close to the house where the couple lived. The victims were lying face-down on a cot with packaging tape over their mouths and noses. A stretchable nylon rope was tied around Madhu's neck. A decorative sword was found lying near the bodies. Nothing in the house had been disturbed to indicate a robbery. Senior police officials, including SSP Mohammad Aqil, also reached the spot. The interrogation of the employees revealed several holes in their stories, the police said.

SSP Mohammad Aqil said: ``We have arrested them on the basis of circumstantial evidence. Vikram, who reported the crime, told the police that armed persons had tied him up. He was not sure of the whereabouts of other employees. Instead, he said that he suspected that Ghais had been killed.'' When asked why he had not looked for the couple and freed his colleagues before coming to the police post, Vikram reportedly could not give a satisfactory reply. When the police team had reached the spot only Jeevan was found tied up and the rest were just hanging around the farmhouse and came forward on their own.

``Jeevan also gave several contradictory statements to our questioning,'' the police said.

The main entrance of the mansion, which Shahnaz Husain uses often, was found locked from the outside. However, when the police entered the house they found the scabbard of one of the two swords, which was found next to the bodies, in the kitchen. Since the lock of the house was still intact, the involvement of outsiders was all but ruled out. The tracker dog's movement which was limited to the farmhouse complex and not outside, strengthened the police suspicions of an ``inside job''.

Those arrested are Vikram, Santosh Bajpai, Jeevan, Hari Singh and Dhananjay Kumar Sinha. Later this evening, the SSP reconstructed the sequence of events. ``The retrenched dog-handler, Pandey, hatched the murder plan out of revenge and roped in the five employees and two of his friends. Last night when the couple was sleeping, they were gagged with tape, dragged to the storeroom and strangulated to death. They put tape around their noses to ensure death. While Pandey fled the spot with two others, Vikram staged the drama and informed the police''.