The hands, feet and the abdomen portion are missing, confirmed Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Syed Waquar Raza. Preliminary investigation suggests that the woman, supposedly married (due to the vermilion mark on forehead), was murdered elsewhere and the body was dumped there and that there has been a deliberate attempt to dismember the victim, said another police officer.

A brick was found inside the bag containing the head, indicating that there would have been an attempt to dump the body in some waterbody, he said. He also added that no blood stain was found in the place (where the bags were found) that was also in close proximity to the Watgunge police station.

The police circulated a photograph of the victim’s head across all city stations and zeroed in on two missing women from different parts of the city who shared similar features. Verification is underway to determine if either of these cases is linked to the gruesome discovery, the officer said.

According to the police, a group of youths who was chatting in the area spotted the polythene bags at 2.50 pm. “We are examining the CCTV footages in the area. There were three black polythene bags. The woman seems to be around 30-35-year old,” DC (Port) Harikrishna Pai told reporters.