Mumbai, Sept 12: 39-year-old Siddharth Kiran Sanghvi, a Mumbai-based vice president of the HDFC Bank, was "an incidental target" of murder accused Sarfaraz Shaikh, said the Mumbai Police.

According to an investigator privy to the probe so far, Sanghvi was among the three bank employees whom Shaikh had allegedly planned to rob on the evening of Wednesday. Since the deceased was the first to reach the parking lot at 8pm, the 20-year-old attacked him.

Shaikh pressed a knife on the banker's neck in a bid to extract money from him. Since Sanghi attempted to resist the heist attempt, his neck ended up being slit, the accused has told interrogators.

Panicked by the knife piercing into his neck, Shaikh decided to eliminate him completely. Subsequently, he stabbed Sanghi's chest and abdomen 14 times.

The murder was committed on the third floor of the building housing HDFC bank in Kamala Mills compound. The floor is designated for car parkings. After killing Sanghavi, Shaikh waited for three hours to avoid being caught in the traffic.

At 11:20pm, he took the deceased to Haji Malang in Kalyan and dumped off his body. He later returned to Kopar Khairane in Navi Mumbai, after abandoning Sanghvi's car near the Airoli creek.

Shaikh, who has worked as a contractual labourer at the Kamala Mills compound, apart from being a part-time private taxi driver, claimed that he was financially stressed and decided to rob one among the three top HDFC bank executives.

He was caught by the Navi Mumbai police on Saturday, after he switched on the mobile phone of Sanghvi. Shaikh, on Monday, confessed to his crime before the metropolitan magistrate court in Bhoiwada. The magistrate sent him to police remand till September 19.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Sep 12, 2018 11:28 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).