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"Jealousy" and "denial" is how Rachel Baldeo describes the labelling of her mother Radica Rhada Baldeo as an outside woman after she was murdered alongside her lover Dipchand (Kumar Sanu) Heeralal on Thursday.
At her Eccles Village, Williamsville home yesterday, Rachel said she did not want to get embroiled in any bacchanal, but needed to clear her mother's name and for police to find the killer.
Tragedy unfolded on Thursday when a relative went to Heeralal's ranch along American Flat Road, Williamsville, and found the couple, both 53, dead with gunshot wounds to the body. In an interview with Heeralal's wife, Darcy Hosein, on Friday, she said that she never knew Heeralal and Baldeo were living together. Hosein said that Heeralal built on a two-acre agricultural plot he received from Caroni (1975) Ltd five years ago. Because he enjoyed being on the land where he planted crops and reared livestock, he eventually stopped living home. She said she met Baldeo ten years ago when she ran away with Heeralal but thought that relationship ended and she went back to her husband.
"I stayed here with my children and I never went to see where he lives. He always told me to call him before I come down there. Now I know why," Hosein said.
But yesterday, Rachel said it was five years since Baldeo and Heeralal began living together. She said her mother, a domestic worker, would go to her place of employment in Couva and return home every evening to Heeralal. She said she and her siblings also visited them at the ranch.
"As far as I know, my mother and Sanu came to a decision that they wanted to make a life together down in the back there. That was five years ago. Our father accepted it and we as children accepted it so we had considered Dipchand as our stepfather," Rachel said.
Baldeo's estranged husband, Peter, said that he and his wife separated years before she started to live with Heeralal. He said amends were made and they had a healthy relationship because they had children together. As time went along, they all became good friends.
"She should not put those things in the papers. Look at how they died. The whole village knew they were living together and you're here and you don't know that?"
Baldeo's relatives said they had no idea why someone murdered them and up to yesterday, police had arrested no suspect. An autopsy is expected on Monday and Rachel said they will then plan her funeral. She said that they wanted to host the funerals together but Heeralal's family had objected. She is hoping that the funerals fall on the same day and both bodies will be cremated at the Shore of Peace, South Oropouche. When the Sunday Guardian visited Hosein's home yesterday, a male relative, who was cleaning the yard, said that she was inside with family and was not feeling to talk.