BBC Studios is poised to launch Vishal, an investigative podcast series exploring the long unsolved case of Vishal Mehrotra. The nine-part series drops on April 17th.
The podcast investigates the disappearance of eight-year-old Mehrotra, who was taken from the streets of London on the day of the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer in 1981. Seven months later his partial remains were discovered in a small patch of woodland in rural Sussex, many miles from home.
Forty years on, and despite the emergence of new evidence, no-one had been brought to justice for the abduction and death of Vishal and the police appeared to have exhausted all their leads. Then, as the world went into lockdown in 2020, a BBC local reporter received a secretive message from a person who had worked within the police – saying they’d seen something extraordinary that could blow the case open.
In the series, Vishal’s 30 year-old half-brother Suchin Mehrotra and investigative reporter Colin Campbell set out to gather the pieces and try to get answers. What they uncovered took them deep into the disturbing underworld of what appeared to be a completely separate crime. “The Vishal Mehrotra case is a heart-breaking tragedy, and it was essential to provide more answers to his family,” said Campbell.
Vishal will be available on a range of platforms in the UK as well as BBC Sounds. It can also be accessed via Apple Podcasts in the US, Canada and Australia. The series is written and produced by Primetime Emmy Award-winning documentary director Satiyesh Manoharajah. Audio production and sound design is by Steve Urquhart.
