Meerut/IBNS: A video posted online has come into the fore in the gruesome murder case of the former Merchant Navy officer in Meerut showing the accused wife-Muskaan Rastogi playing Holi with her lover Sahil Shukla just 11 days after killing her husband, chopping up his body and leaving it to rot in a cement-lined drum.

Ex-Merchant Navy officer Saurabh Rajput was killed by his wife, Muskaan Rastogi, and Sahil Shukla, with whom she was having an extramarital affair, on March 3.

The video posted by Muskaan on March 14, shows them laughing and enjoying Holi with their faces covered in colour.

They both sway lightly, their cheeks pressed against each other while Sahil, who appears to be high, makes some happy gestures with his right hand.

Music can be heard in the background along with other people can also be seen, indicating that they were celebrating the festival with a group. 

The couple had visited Shimla and Manali after committing the murder. Another video from their Himachal Pradesh trip has surfaced in which Muskaan is seen feeding Sahil a piece of cake, wishing him"happy birthday" and then kissing him.

Some photos from the trip also show Muskaan walking in the snow.

Muskaan and Sahil have been arrested for killing her husband former Merchant Navy officer Saurabh Rajput in Meerut on March 3 after drugging him.

How did they execute the murder?

The brutal murder was planned by his wife, who convinced her boyfriend that his dead mother was speaking to him - through Snapchat - from the grave, media reports quoting the police said.

Former Merchant Navy officer Saurabh Rajput married Muskaan Rastogi in 2016 and she began an affair with his friend, Sahil, sometime later.

Saurabh, who worked in a London bakery, came to know about the affair in 2021, after their landlord had spotted Muskaan and Sahil in an "objectionable" position and had also filed for a divorce.

However, he was convinced by his family to stay with his wife.

The wife had been planning her husband's murder since November last year, officials told the media.

She had purchased two knives under the pretext of cutting chicken days before her husband's return on February 24 to celebrate their daughter's sixth birthday.

She had also pretended to have anxiety so she could visit a doctor and access the pills she would need to put him to sleep before killing him.

Rajput's body was chopped into 15 pieces and dumped in a drum, which was sealed with cement.

Muskan and her boyfriend then tried to figure out a way to dispose of it without arousing suspicion.

Her family has said that both Muskan and Sahil did drugs regularly and one of the possible reasons that they killed Saurabh was that he would "stop their drug sessions".

Sahil's dependence on drugs also made him susceptible to one of Muskaan's sinister plans in the lead-up to the murder.

She made an account on the social media messaging app Snapchat and managed to convince her lover that her dead mother was using it to speak to him.

"The account was not in the name of Sahil's mother but the messages were sent by Muskaan in a way that she made him believe that his dead mother had reincarnated and was speaking to him," NDTV reported.