Kottayam/ Kannur: The old but freshly painted tiled-roof house sits on a 13-cent plot on the edge of the busy Thaiparambu-Ithipuzha road.
A year ago, Ashok A G (59) and his wife Krishnamma had secured the perimeter of the plot -- 8km from Vaikom -- with green scaffolding nets. The daily wage labourers did not have the money to build a wall. But neither could they afford to leave the plot open because Jeeva (6) and Jhanvi (4), his two energy-ball grandchildren, would run to the road in the blink of an eye. "The children kept Ashok on his toes. But those six-seven months were his best days," says Indira N G, his school classmate, and neighbour.
His daughter Anju Asok had left the children with him before going to the UK to join the Kettering General Hospital at Northamptonshire as a staff nurse in 2021.
She wanted to find a home, settle down, and zero in on a school for the children before taking them to the UK.
In June, Anju (35) and her husband Chelevalan Saju (52) came from Kettering and took the children back.
The house fell silent. The scaffolding nets looked silly. And Ashok and Krishnamma returned to their mundane lives of being daily-wage labourers.
But their lives were shattered Friday morning when his second daughter Amrita got a call from Anju's friend in Kettering.
Northamptonshire Police have arrested Saju on the suspicion of murdering Anju and their children Jeeva and Jhanvi. "It was a shock for everybody in Ithipuzha because Ashok always told us that he had a caring son-in-law. And we thought his hard days were over," said Indira.
Years ago, when Anju and Amrita were little girls, their mother Kanchana had ended her life. Since then, Ashok had toiled hard to raise the two daughters and invested in their education.
After Anju's schooling, Ashok took a loan and sent her to a nursing school in Hyderabad. He found himself a life partner in Krishnamma. "A dotting stepmother," said Indira.
After her education, Anju worked in Saudi Arabia for a few years, returned to Vaikom to prepare for IELTS (International English Language Testing System), and took up a job with Amrita Hospital in Kochi before landing a job in Kettering. "Anju Asok was an internationally trained nurse who joined our KGH family in 2021 and predominantly worked on Barnwell B - one of our Orthopaedic wards," said Kettering General Hospital in a statement.
For Ashok, these are empty words. "Today he told me his biggest mistake was educating his daughter. He is shattered. He thinks Anju would have been alive if she had not become a nurse and gone to the UK," said Indira.
Only after he was told that his daughter and grandchildren were murdered that he opened up on his son-in-law, she said.
Ashok told Manorama News on Friday that Saju had anger issues. "He used to get violent for even small issues. While on video calls, we could see that Anju was never pleasant," he told Anita Sebastian of Manorama News.
Ashok, however, said there were no major issues between the couple. Saju was under severe mental stress because he could not find a job in the UK, he said.
Anju married Saju in 2012. He is a native of Kombanpara at Kannur's Padiyoor panchayat, which is 320 km from Vaikom. "She found him through a matrimonial ad in a newspaper," said Indira.
Ashok discouraged Anju from marrying Saju because of the 12-year age gap. "But he had a job in Saudi Arabia and she thought the marriage was her ticket to get a job abroad," she said. "And he turned out to be a good fellow, too."
'Saju's mother yet to know about the deaths'
Back at the remote Kombanpara village in Kannur district, no one has the heart to break the news of the three deaths to Saju's 85-year-old mother Pankajazhi. "We told her that all four met with a road accident," said Loosy Sivadas, a family friend and panchayat member. She and Padiyoor panchayat president B Shamsudhin had gone to her house Friday morning.
"It will take a few days before the autopsies are done and the bodies sent to Kerala. We have time till then," she said.
Saju is the only brother of six sisters. Their father died 30 years ago. They are a close-knit family, said Loosy.
Saju's elder sister Omana, who lives with their mother, was inconsolable. "Anju was our only sister-in-law. She was the treasure of our family," she said.
Loosy pushed Omana into the bathroom when she could not hold back her tears, lest the aged mother would know.
Saju left home after his pre-degree (class 12) and found a job as a driver in Bengaluru. Later, a company in Saudi Arabia hired him as a driver. "That's when he married Anju," said Loosy.
Three days ago she video-chatted with Saju to seek his permission to cut a panchayat road through his property. "He was sad that he could not get a job there. His driving licence was not valid there," she said.
He had undergone knee surgery to remove a lump. "His leg was bandaged. He told me he had nothing to do after the kids went to school and Anju went to the hospital," said Loosy.
A member of the Malayali association in Kettering told Onmanorama that Saju tried to start a food delivery business in the small town. "But it did not work out," said the member, who had met Saju and Anju a few times during children's birthday parties. His children and Anju's children went to the same school.
Kettering did not have a big Malayali community till recently. "In the past two years, the general hospital hired around 200 nurses. A lot of Malayali nurses got jobs here. My wife is also a nurse in the hospital. And that's how I reached Kettering," he said.
The triple murder is the first big shock for the small but growing Malayali community there. "We are working with the officials to send the bodies back home. But it will take a few days," he said.