Family of Murdered Indian Woman Harshita Brella Retraces Her Final Days in England
We promise to fight for you to get justice. We can’t forget you, Harshita. The words were handwritten on a small card tucked into a bouquet of white and pink flowers – one of several such offerings that Satbir Singh and Sudesh Kumari carried across England this May, retracing the final days of Harshita Brella, the daughter they had lost. The first bouquet was left at the Corby Boating Club in Northamptonshire, beside the lake where their elder daughter Sonia Dabas took a photograph of them that she still returns to. In it, Satbir Singh and Sudesh Kumari are posed stiffly outside the cafe. It is the sort of place a family might visit on holiday. This was not a holiday. It was, in fact, the first time either of Harshita’s parents had ever travelled abroad. “For most families, the first trip abroad is a milestone — a chance to see a new country, spend time together, create memories that last a lifetime,” Sonia says. “But for us it was nothing like that.” For fourteen days, the family moved from one address to another, each one a place their daughter had been. Nearly two years earlier, CCTV cameras above the boating lake cafe at the Corby Boating Club had captured Harshita walking beside her husband, Pankaj Lamba. It was the last time she was seen alive. “When police released the footage, we watched it over and over,” Sonia recalls. “It was the last time we would ever see her walking, alive, and we kept looking for anything – some sign, something we’d missed.” And on May 14, 2026, Sonia accompanied her parents to England. At the airport, Sonia remembers, her mother kept looking for Harshita. “‘Late ho gayi hogi’ (she must be running late), she kept saying,” Sonia says. “Even now, some part of her has not fully accepted that Harshita is gone.” After they checked in, the lake was the first stop. From there they went to the house in Corby where Lamba had been staying, and to the curb outside it where investigators alleged he parked the car that would later carry Harshita’s body to Ilford, in east London. Desperate for anything the investigation might have overlooked, the family went door to door – something a neighbour may have seen or heard but never told the police. “But they were reluctant to speak,” Sonia says. From Ilford, Lamba is alleged to have taken the Elizabeth line to Heathrow, before boarding a flight out of the country. According to court records, he landed in Mumbai on November 12, 2024, and from there flew on to Delhi. The broad facts of Harshita’s murder have been public for nearly two years. What brought her family to England this May was not new evidence but the absence of it — the slow, unresolved muddle of a case that has produced no arrest and no conclusion. “We could not be with her then,” Sonia says, “but at least we came by where she was now.” There is one detail Harshita’s family keeps returning to: the car was parked directly outside the house where her husband lived, close to a tree. “Of everywhere we went, that was the hardest place to leave,” Sonia says. “My mother broke down completely laying the flowers there – she couldn’t stop crying, and none of us could console her.” “So far we don’t know if he killed her at her house, or his house, or the lake, or where,” Sudesh says, her voice breaking. According to Northamptonshire police, Harshita was allegedly murdered somewhere in Northamptonshire and driven to Ilford, where her body was discovered in the boot of the car on November 14th; a post-mortem listed strangulation as the likely cause of death. The hardest stop was the room – one Harshita had moved into on her own, after she left Lamba and was placed under police protection. It was a small, cramped space in shared accommodation in Corby, sublet with a stranger, a far cry from the life the family had imagined for her when she left India as a bride. “If we had even a little idea she was living in such a small place, struggling so much, it would have been a sign, a clue that something was horribly wrong,” Sonia said. “We could have stepped in so much earlier.” It was only in August, Sonia says, that Harshita first told her family about the violence in her marriage – around the same time she was seen fleeing her home after an altercation with Lamba, on August 29, 2024. She later filed a domestic abuse complaint and was placed under police protection. “We urged her to come home,” Sonia says. “But she wanted to stay and see the complaint through.” On November 10, she called home for what would be the last time – she was making dinner, she said, and waiting for Lamba, who wanted to talk. Four days later, she was dead . Even now, the shock of it sits visibly on Sudesh’s face. “We could not do anything,” she says, looking again at the photograph of the room, guilt threading through every word. For Harshita’s family, the meeting with investigators was the most important part of their visit. Among those present were Detective Superintendent Johnny Campbell, Deputy Chief Constable Ash Tuckley, and Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner Danielle Stone. But the meeting offered the family few answers. Sonia said the investigators told them that the case involved a serious crime and that they could not disclose much because the information was sensitive. “They did not really reveal if any new facts had emerged,” Sonia said. “They said that in an ongoing investigation, no such information can be shared. But they said both countries are in touch as far as the extradition of Lamba is concerned.” The family had also hoped to attend another significant proceeding arising from the investigation. They were not permitted to do so. On August 29, 2024, Harshita reported domestic abuse to the police. She was subsequently classified as being at high risk of domestic abuse, placed in a refuge, and assigned an Independent Domestic Violence Adviser. Lamba was arrested on September 3 and released on conditional bail two days later, on the condition that he would not contact Harshita. Despite her classification as being at high risk, she was killed on November 10, weeks after making her complaint. Her body was found four days later. The case prompted the Independent Office for Police Conduct (I.O.P.C.), Britain’s police watchdog, to open an investigation on November 20, 2024, after a referral from Northamptonshire Police. The investigation examined the actions of four police officers and whether their handling of Harshita’s abuse allegations warranted misconduct proceedings . The I.O.P.C. later determined that the allegations were serious enough to warrant formal disciplinary proceedings. “After a thorough review of the evidence, we have determined four officers should face disciplinary proceedings,” said Derrick Campbell, the I.O.P.C.’s director of engagement. “It will be for a police disciplinary panel to determine whether the allegations are proven.” On May 21, 2026, two of the four officers – a sergeant and a chief inspector – faced misconduct hearings. “At first, we were invited to attend the hearing, and we went with the lawyers,” Sonia said. However, the family was later informed that it was a private hearing. “This was really unfair to us. We wanted to attend the hearing and find out whether there had been any lapses on the part of the officers,” Sonia said, adding the family had serious concerns about how the police handled Harshita’s case. They questioned whether officers had taken adequate steps to protect her after classifying her as being at high risk. “The police themselves had classified the case as high risk,” Sonia said. “There are serious concerns about how the unit handled the case and whether they gave Harshita enough protection. We will have answers to these questions only when the proceedings are made public.” However closed off the official proceedings were, the family found something warmer waiting for them elsewhere. The trip was also an act of advocacy, and the family had not paid for it themselves. NGOs and private donors raised the funds that sent them to England, and once there, the family found a reception they had not expected. “Local council members turned up at Harshita’s memorial without being asked. Refugee-support groups offered solidarity,” Sonia says. The Member of Parliament for Corby met with the family personally. “We were promised that the case would stay a government priority. That is a positive,” Sonia says. Harshita’s father learned of his daughter’s death on November 15, 2024. Four days later, he filed a complaint at the Palam Village Police Station alleging dowry harassment and murder. The case has moved forward on paper, even as the search for Lamba has not. The case is now before the trial court and has reached a crucial stage. On September 29, the court is scheduled to hear arguments on framing the charges. Investigators, however, say their primary focus remains tracing Lamba, the main accused. “We have obtained and analyzed call detail records and other technical data relating to the mobile numbers of Lamba and his relatives on several occasions in an attempt to establish his whereabouts,” a senior police official said. In May 2025, the police declared Lamba a proclaimed offender . They also issued a Look Out Circular to prevent him from leaving the country or to alert authorities if he attempted to re-enter. “We have also frozen the bank accounts,” a police officer said. Investigators have also tracked Lamba’s digital footprint, the officer said. Notices were sent to a long list of companies, including three airlines and nine e-commerce platforms, as part of the effort to locate him. The inquiries, however, produced no information that helped trace Lamba, according to a police status report. The only breakthrough, officials said, has been the arrest of Lamba’s parents. Back in the UK, investigators said they remain committed to securing justice for Harshita and her family. “The investigation into Harshita Brella’s death is ongoing… we are continuing to work with the appropriate agencies both in the UK and internationally,” Detective Superintendent Johnny Campbell said in response to a query from The Indian Express. “We remain as determined as ever to secure justice for Harshita and her family.”
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