Woman on honeymoon falls into Nainital gorge, husband says scared by snake

Delhi-based Tamanna’s brother, however, has alleged foul play and claimed that her husband Shadab could have killed her.

A 25-year-old Delhi woman died of injuries she sustained after allegedly falling into a 250 feet gorge while clicking selfies with her husband in Nainital, police said Tuesday.

Tammana had reached Nainital on Sunday with her husband Saddam. They hired a cab the following day for a tour of the surrounding lakes.(HT FILE (For representation only))

As per a preliminary report, Tamanna was standing on a parapet along the road and allegedly lost her footing in panic when she saw a snake.

Tamanna and Shadab, also a resident of Delhi, were on their honeymoon, police said.

“Tamanna died within minutes of reaching the hospital in Nainital. After carrying out the post-mortem examination, the body was handed over to her father Mohammad Shabbir who reached here in the morning” said Pramod Pathak, station officer, Tallital police station.

Tammana, who went by her first name, lived in Jal Board, Mandoli village in north-east Delhi, and married 30-year-old Saddam in November last year. The couple reached Nainital on Sunday. The next day, they hired a cab to go sightseeing in areas nearby. While returning from Bhowali, 11 km from Nainital, Tammana asked the cab driver to pull over as she was feeling nauseated.

Cab driver Kishan Singh told the police that Tammana and Shadab alighted from the vehicle and sat on the parapet — a safety barrier erected on one side of the road. Singh said he was inside the cab and soon heard someone shouting and crying.

The driver reportedly said, quoting Shadab, that Tamanna panicked after she saw a snake, lost her balance and slipped into a deep gorge.

“The driver, passersby and Shadab rescued the woman who had sustained serious injuries. They took her to a government hospital where she died during treatment,” police official said.

On Tuesday noon, Tamanna’s brother Arif filed a complaint with police alleging foul play and said she could have been killed by Shadab.

Shadab is employed as an Ayurveda practitioner at a private hospital in Noida. Police said they will investigative into the matter.

This is the third incident of a tourist dying in Uttarakhand in less than a month. A 33-year-old woman from Delhi drowned during rafting when her raft overturned in a rapid in Rishikesh. Prior to that, a 58-year-old tourist from Ghaziabad was found dead in a hotel in Nainital under mysterious circumstances.

Earlier, a 10-year-old girl from Rajasthan had died after sustaining critical injuries when she fell into a ditch while trying to escape a pack of stray dogs in Nainital.