Vijayawada Police Detain 27-Year-Old Man After Mall Worker Found Dead in Lodge

Vijayawada police took a 27-year-old man into custody on Friday after discovering the body of a missing 35-year-old shopping mall employee inside a lodge near the city bus terminal.

Paidishetti Erramma, who worked as a sales assistant at the Shubhamastu shopping mall, vanished earlier this week after failing to return home to Peddapulipaka village. Her husband sounded the alarm. He walked into the Suryaraopet police station and filed a formal missing-person complaint, prompting detectives to review surveillance camera feeds across commercial corridors in Vijayawada district.

CCTV footage quickly broke the case open. Cameras picked up Erramma entering the Ramaiah Lodge late on Wednesday night alongside a man identified by police as Ramu.

CCTV Timeline and Lodge Room Discovery

Surveillance tapes documented the final recorded movements of the 35-year-old sales worker. Erramma and Ramu reached the lodge at approximately 11:30 pm on November 11, walking past the reception desk and heading directly to a private room.

The suspect walked out alone hours later. Erramma never emerged.

Tracing the digital trail, Krishna Lanka police converged on the lodge premises on Friday, November 13, and breached the room. They found Erramma dead inside under suspicious circumstances. Officers secured the scene, summoned forensic teams, and transferred the body to a nearby government hospital for a mandatory postmortem examination.

Joint Interrogation and Legal Proceedings

Detectives tracked down Ramu shortly after discovering the scene and placed him in custody. Krishna Lanka and Suryaraopet police are now running a coordinated inquiry to reconstruct the sequence of events inside the room, determine the precise cause of death, and uncover the motive.

Police officials said formal penal charges will be framed once the government hospital forensic panel submits the preliminary autopsy report.