London: In a bizarre incident, a 40-year-old NRI (Non-Resident Indian) doctor is believed to have killed his cancer specialist wife before allegedly leaping to his death from a 40-metre high bridge with their son.

Dr Jayaprakash Chiti is believed to have stabbed Anupama Damera, 36, a breast cancer consultant, at their home before jumping off the bridge with his two-year-old son, Pranau, in Ipswich yesterday (Feb 1, 2004), police told reporters.

The bodies of Chiti and the boy were recovered from the river Orwell near the Orwell Bridge at Ipswich when police and ambulance crews were called to the suicide spot at 3.45 am.

Another boy, aged 11, was found alive in the family home. It is thought that he was probably asleep in the house at the time of the murder.

The couple had an arranged marriage in India, where Damera did her medical studies before coming to England, and she trained as a radiologist in Nottingham.

An alarm was raised when police received a report about an abandoned car at the bridge in the early hours yesterday. Police called in coastguards who searched the river under the quarter-of-a mile long bridge from a launch.

They discovered the bodies in the water by the bridge and traced the car found near by to a house a few kms away in the village of Rushmere St Andrew. When they broke in, they discovered that Damera had been stabbed to death.

A police spokeswoman said, "There the police discovered the body of a woman who had received fatal stab wounds. A boy was found alive in the house and is currently being cared for by friends of the family."