According to police, the murder took place between 11.30 pm on Saturday night and 4 am today at their residence at Damu Patil Compound, Khinda Pada, Bhandup.

Investigations reveal that Balu Mane (37) had poisoned his wife Hansabai (21) before slitting her throat. He then stabbed himself in the neck and bled to death. The couple were found in a pool of blood by Hansabai's father Bijaram Wagle at around 4 am. Bijaram had been staying with the couple for the last few months.

Bijaram, who complained to Bhandup police after seeing his daughter dead told investigators the husband and wife had not been on good terms with each other for the last few months. Quarrels erupted frequently and often resulted in the husband beating up the wife, he said. The bodies have been sent for post-mortem, and only a chemical analysis report on the viscera will tell if the wife was poisoned and then killed,police said. Police have recovered a knife from the single-room tenement.

Meanwhile, the crime branch today arrested a 22-year-old youth from Uttar Pradesh for selling a countrymade handgun near Mayur cinema, Kandivli. Crime branch officials arrested Mohammed Azam Ansari from Kanpur and seized the `katta' that was concealed under brown jaggery.

On Friday, the crime branch had nabbed Harish Narsayya Muthuraj alias Harish Telugu, a member of the Arun Gawli gang. He was arrested from a hutment colony in Nashik where he had fled after an abortive bid at robbing a petrol pump. Four Gawli men were arrested after they attempted to rob the pump at Kurla on June 25. Harish was arrested by unit 10 of the crime branch which went to fetch him from Nashik.