…body buried in shallow grave at Belle West

THE body of a 67-year-old cattle farmer was discovered last Monday morning in a shallow grave in the backlands of Belle West, Phase One Housing Scheme, on the West Bank of Demerara.

The family of Sohan Ramdial is unsure of why anyone would have wanted to murder the farmer, while neighbours were left in disbelief at the discovery in their quiet farming community.

“I never expected that my father would’ve died in this way. I mean everybody got to die but not in this way, he didn’t deserve this death,” cried Ramdial’s daughter, Padmini.
Ramdial was last seen alive by his wife and others around 06:00hrs on Sunday when he left his Lot 69 Claybrick Road, Canal No. 2, home to tend to his cattle in the backdam. “He gone and seh he ah go see cow and milk cow fuh give them people, and when he nah come back me seh he must be guh wait ‘til late off and then come back. So, last night me open the door fuh see if he deh pon the bed, and he nah deh,” wife of the deceased, Lynette John, explained amidst tears, moments after her husband’s body was taken away.
John affirmed that she does not know of anyone who would have wanted to harm her husband. “He does just go milk he cow and come back; he and nobody nah got story,” his wife said.

Alarmed by her husband’s absence, early Monday John alerted her three children who mobilised others and launched a search party for Ramdial. Padmini said they immediately knew all was not right when they reached the area where their father kept his cows. “When we go, the milk bucket is there with the cow tie-up in milking position. Me, me two brothers and a next lil boy, we go and search and by the time that, couple more persons come out and we spread out and search,” Padmini explained.

After searching for some time, it was when they were on their way out of the backdam that they discovered the body, at around 10:30hrs.  “When we coming out back we see the ground look dig up fresh, so meh two brothers dig up and we see a part of a body, so we go to the station– Wales Police Station– and make a report,” she said.

Padmini described her father as someone who kept to himself. “I can’t say if he had problems with anybody, but normally he doesn’t trouble anybody; he comes, looks his cow, and goes home. He doesn’t have problems but apparently somebody and he got problem; but I don’t know, I can’t say,” she said.