A mother-daughter duo were caught red-handed by locals while attempting to dispose of a body in the Ganga river in Kolkata on Tuesday. Both the women, Falguni Ghosh and her mother, Arati Ghosh, have been arrested. The body has been identified as that of Sumita Ghosh (55), the sister of Falguni Ghosh's father-in-law.

The women were first spotted at around 8 am near the banks of the Ganga in north Kolkata's Kumartuli with a blue trolley bag. Locals, noticing their suspicious movement, decided to confront them. The women initially refused to open the bag. After being prodded further, they revealed that they were carrying the remains of their pet dog.

However, it only fuelled further suspicion. "When we intercepted them, they claimed that they were carrying the dead body of their pet dog. But it seemed more suspicious because they were not willing to open the bag at any cost," one of the locals told India Today.

In the meantime, the locals alerted the police, who arrived at the scene. The trolley bag was forced open only to find the bloodied body of a woman inside. The duo were then taken to the police station and questioned before being arrested.

According to Falguni's statement, the deceased, Sumita, is the sister of her father-in-law. Sumita, a native of Assam's Jorhat, has been separated from her husband and had been staying with the mother-daughter duo at their Kolkata residence since February 11, police sources said.

A senior Kolkata Police official said Sumita was killed during a heated altercation with Falguni on Monday evening.

"Falguni is not on good terms with her husband and stays separate. There was an altercation on Monday around 4 pm. Falguni pushed the deceased against a wall and she became unconscious. When she regained consciousness, another, more vigorous, fight ensued. During this, Falguni allegedly hit her face and neck with a brick, leading to her death," the police official said.

The mother-daughter duo then put the body in a trolley bag and attempted to dispose of it in the river.

A case of unnatural death has been registered at North Port police station while the body has been sent to Calcutta Medical College for postmortem. The case has been transferred to Barasat district police.