Rumpa’s Death: Cops work on clues to solve mystery

Rubaiyat Sharmin Rumpa. Photo: Collected

Footprints on the edge of a building’s roof and a pair of sandals found near the body.

Investigators were working on these clues to crack the mystery surrounding the death of Stamford University student Rubaiyat Sharmin Rumpa.

Twenty-two-year-old Rumpa, a second-year English student of the private university in the city’s Siddheshwari, was found dead on an alley near the building on Wednesday night. Police learned about her identity the next day.

Talking to The Daily Star yesterday, a police official, involved in the investigation, said Rumpa was wearing the sandals when she had gone near her home in adjacent Shantibagh area on Wednesday evening.

The official also said they suspect Rumpa had been to the buildings’ rooftop.

“We searched the area extensively and found footprints on an edge of 11-storey Ayesha Shopping Complex yesterday,” said the official, wishing not to be named.

“The footprints looked fresh. It seems someone in sandals stood on the edge very recently,” the official said, adding that there were several gaping holes on the roof and walking on it could be risking.

“We are trying to know whether she had gone to the rooftop. If she had, how did she go there,” he said.

Investigators could not confirm whether it was murder or a case of suicide, he added.

Police sources said Rumpa went near her home in Shantibagh after giving tuitions to her fourth grader student in the same area.

She called her mother and asked her to send her cousin Jahidul, 12, downstairs with a pair of sandals. As they met, Rumpa gave him her sandals and wore the one brought by him. She also gave Jahidul her purse where she kept her mobile and money.

Rumpa then left without saying where she would go, the sources said.

Later around 10:45pm, some tenants living in the buildings on the Siddheshwari lane heard a huge sound. A few of them came out and saw a girl lying upside down, motionless on the alley. There was blood on her face.

Talking to this correspondent yesterday, two locals said they did not hear any screams.

On Thursday night, law enforcers came to know that the deceased was the daughter of a police inspector named Rokonuddin. He is posted to a police camp in Habiganj.

Earlier that day, police filed a murder case in connection with the incident.

This correspondent went to the roof of the 11-storey building yesterday and saw the door open. The roof had no fencing.

A security guard of the building said its first four floors are used as commercial space while the rest are for residential units.

Asked, he said he was not on-duty on Wednesday night.

The doors of adjacent two buildings’ roof remain closed all the time.

Contacted, Inspector (investigation) of Ramna Police Station Jahirul Islam, also the investigation officer of the case, said they were examining all possible clues. “We’ve sent samples to the CID lab to find out whether the footprints and the sandals are of the same person.”

Investigators said they were working to find out what Rumpa was doing between 7:00pm and 10:45pm on Wednesday.

Apart from police and CID, the Detective Branch of police is also assisting the probe by looking into her mobile phone and conversations on social media, said sources there.

On Thursday, Dr Sohel Mahmud, head of Dhaka Medical College’s forensic medicine department, told reporters that the victim’s hands, legs, waist and spinal cord had fractured.

They also took samples from her body to determine whether she was raped.

Meanwhile, Rumpa was buried at her family graveyard at Bijoynagor village in Mymensingh sadar upazila yesterday morning. Her family members were struggling to come to terms with the loss.

In Dhaka’s Siddheshwari area, her fellow students and teachers of Stamford University brought out a procession and formed a human chain yesterday, demanding proper investigation into the incident.