Sharmila Shinde, who died in the Netherlands under mysterious circumstances, was 'so scared' she had asked a friend in the country for a local cop's and lawyer's number days before her death, a close friend told mid-day on Monday. Her husband, Avdhut Shinde, missing since her death, had become 'extremely violent' after she told him of her plan to divorce him, the friend said. Sharmila's decomposed body was recovered from the refrigerator inside her flat in Raspberry Street, The Hague, on May 21 with both the Dutch cops and Mumbai police investigating the matter.

Sharmila "was never happy with her husband and had been planning to divorce him. She had narrated her husband's torturous behaviour to her friends and relatives but everyone suggested her to save the relation," the friend explained.