ALWAR/JAIPUR — On January 23, 2026, the Hindu festival of Basant Panchami heralded the arrival of spring, a day traditionally associated with the color yellow, the goddess Saraswati, and the blooming of new life. In a secluded hotel in Alwar, far from the prying eyes of the media, a wedding ceremony took place that offered a jarring counter-narrative to the day's purity.

The bride, Priya Seth, 34, wore the traditional red of an Indian bride. The groom, Hanuman Prasad, 29, donned a festive sherwani. To the casual observer, they were just another couple solemnizing their love. But the guests—a handful of close relatives—were stripped of their mobile phones, and photography was strictly forbidden. The secrecy was not due to celebrity status, but rather the grim infamy of the union.

This was the wedding of two life-convicts. The bride is known in police files as the "Tinder Killer" who stuffed a body into a suitcase. The groom is a mass murderer who once hid a corpse in a blue plastic drum. Their marriage, sanctioned by the Rajasthan High Court and facilitated by a 15-day parole, has become a macabre case study in the Indian justice system’s balancing act between crime, punishment, and the fundamental right to life.

The "Viral" Invitation and the Panic

The road to the altar was paved with panic. Days before the wedding, an invitation card printed by the groom’s family began circulating on social media. It listed the venue as Hanuman’s ancestral home in Barodamev village, Alwar, and innocuously included his contact number.

The viral image alerted not just the media, but potentially the families of their victims. The quiet village of Barodamev, where the groom’s house had been decked with lights and flowers, suddenly became a focal point of public outrage. Fearing protests or violence, the families were forced to abandon the decorated house on the morning of the wedding.

"We are happy our son is finally getting married," Hanuman’s mother, Chandra Kala, told reporters, even as the couple was whisked away to an undisclosed location—believed to be a hotel near the Alwar-Jaipur border—to complete the rituals. The "Ghurchari" (horse-riding ceremony) and the "Chakh Bhat" rituals, performed on January 21 and 22, were conducted in hushed tones, a stark contrast to the loud brutality of the crimes that landed them in prison.

2017: The Massacre in Alwar

To understand the irony of this union, one must revisit the blood-soaked history of the groom. In 2017, Hanuman Prasad was not a groom but a lover entangled in a forbidden affair with a woman named Santosh Sharma.

The obstacle to their romance was Santosh’s husband, Hansraj, and her family. In a plot that investigators later described as "savage," Hanuman and Santosh conspired to wipe the slate clean. They did not stop at murdering Hansraj; they killed four children as well—Hansraj’s three sons and a nephew.

The method was cold and calculated. The victims were incapacitated, then bludgeoned and stabbed. In a detail that would later strangely mirror his future wife’s crime, Hanuman attempted to conceal the evidence by hiding Hansraj’s body inside a blue water drum. The crime was eventually unravelled by the testimony of an 8-year-old survivor, a child who witnessed the carnage. Hanuman was convicted of these five murders in 2023, sentenced to spend the rest of his natural life behind bars.

2018: The Honey-Trap in Jaipur

A year later, 200 kilometers away in Jaipur, Priya Seth was crafting her own legacy of horror. A history sheeter with a penchant for high living and insurmountable debt (reportedly ₹21 lakh), Priya used the dating app Tinder as her hunting ground.

She matched with Dushyant Sharma, a 28-year-old from Delhi who had made the fatal mistake of projecting a false image of wealth on his profile. Believing he was a rich businessman, Priya, along with her live-in partner Dikshant Kamra and friend Lakshya Walia, lured Dushyant to a rented flat in Bajaj Nagar on May 2, 2018.

The romance was a facade for a kidnapping. When Dushyant arrived, he was taken hostage. The trio forced him to call his father, pleading for a ransom of ₹10 lakh. "Papa, they will kill me," he reportedly cried. His father managed to transfer ₹3 lakh—all he could muster.

It wasn't enough. Fearing Dushyant would go to the police, Priya and her accomplices decided to liquidate the "asset." They strangled him, smothered him with a pillow, and finally slit his throat to ensure death. Priya then folded his body into a large suitcase and dumped it near the Amer hills on the Delhi-Jaipur highway. She was convicted in November 2023.

The Sanctuary of Sanganer

How do two such individuals meet? The answer lies in the unique penal philosophy of Rajasthan.

Under the Rajasthan Prisoners Open Air Camp Rules, 1972, convicts who have served one-third of their sentence (including the years spent as undertrials) and have maintained "good conduct" are eligible for open prisons. Since both Priya and Hanuman had spent over six years in judicial custody during their long trials, they qualified for the Sanganer Open Prison Camp shortly after their convictions.

Sanganer is a "jail without walls." Inmates live in small quarters, often with families, and go out to work during the day. It was in this atmosphere of relative liberty that the mass murderer and the suitcase killer crossed paths. Their relationship reportedly blossomed over six months, evolving into a live-in arrangement within the prison camp itself—a liberty almost unimaginable in the strict confines of standard Indian jails.

The Legal Battle

Desiring to legitimize their relationship, the couple moved the Rajasthan High Court. Their lawyer, Vishram Prajapat, argued on the grounds of the fundamental "Right to Marry" and "Right to Progeny" enshrined under Article 21 of the Constitution.

On January 7, 2026, a division bench of Justices Mahendra Kumar Goyal and Chandraprakash Shrimali issued a directive to the state's Parole Advisory Committee to decide on their application within seven days. Bound by the court order and the open prison rules, the committee granted them a 15-day parole, effective from January 21 to February 4, 2026.

The Hollow Echo of Justice

As the newlyweds enjoy their brief honeymoon period before returning to prison on February 5, the families of their victims are left grappling with a sense of betrayal.

Sandeep Loharia, the lawyer representing Dushyant Sharma’s family, expressed shock at the development. "We were not even informed," he stated, vowing to challenge the parole order. For Dushyant’s parents, the image of their son’s killer celebrating a wedding is a cruel mockery of their eternal grief. The same sentiment echoes in Alwar, where the surviving kin of the five people slaughtered by Hanuman see the state facilitating the happiness of a man who destroyed their entire lineage.

Conclusion

The marriage of Priya Seth and Hanuman Prasad is a story of profound contrasts. It highlights the progressive nature of Rajasthan’s open prison system, which refuses to strip convicts of their humanity. Yet, it also casts a long, dark shadow over the concept of retributive justice.

As the couple exchanged garlands on Basant Panchami, they did so standing on the wreckage of six lives. The blue drum and the suitcase remain etched in police records, silent witnesses to the irony that two people who showed no mercy to others have been granted the ultimate mercy of love by the state.

Table 1: Timeline of Key Events

Table 2: Comparative Profile of Convicts

Table 3: Legal Framework (Rajasthan)

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