[10] Described as "handsome, charming and utterly without scruple",[11] he used his looks and cunning to advance his criminal career and obtain celebrity status; he is known to have enjoyed his infamy.

Hotchand Bhawnani Gurmukh Sobhraj was born on 6 April 1944 in Saigon, within the Indochinese Union, to an Indian Sindhi father and Vietnamese mother.

During this time, Sobhraj met and began a romantic relationship with Chantal Compagnon, a young Parisian woman from a conservative family.

Sobhraj proposed marriage to Compagnon but was arrested later the same day for attempting to evade police while driving a stolen vehicle.

After travelling through Eastern Europe with fake documents, robbing tourists whom they befriended along the way, Sobhraj arrived in Bombay (Mumbai) later the same year.

[17][13] On the run, Sobhraj financed his lifestyle by posing as either a gem salesman or drug dealer to impress and befriend tourists, whom he defrauded.

Dominated by Sobhraj, Leclerc became his most devoted follower, turning a blind eye to his crimes and his philandering with local women.

The first victim was a young woman from Seattle, Teresa Knowlton (named Jennie Bollivar in the book Serpentine), who was found drowned in a tidal pool in the Gulf of Thailand, wearing a flowered bikini.

The next victim was a young nomadic Turkish Sephardic Jew, Vitali Hakim, whose burnt body was found on the road to the Pattaya resort, where Sobhraj and his growing clan were staying.

Dutch students Henk Bintanja, 29, and his fiancée Cornelia Hemker, 25, were invited to Thailand after meeting Sobhraj in Hong Kong.

As they recovered, Sobhraj was visited by his previous victim Hakim's French girlfriend, Charmayne Carrou, who had come to investigate her boyfriend's disappearance.

[24] On 18 December, the day the bodies of Bintanja and Hemker were identified, Sobhraj and Leclerc entered Nepal using the deceased couple's passports.

Sobhraj used the passport to travel with Leclerc and Chowdhury; first to Singapore, then to India, and, in March 1976, returning to Bangkok, despite knowing that the authorities there sought him.

[25] Knippenberg had some knowledge of, and had possibly even met, Sobhraj, although the latter's true identity was still unknown to the diplomat, who continued gathering evidence.

It is believed Sobhraj murdered his former accomplice before leaving Malaysia in order to continue his and Leclerc's roles as gem dealers in Geneva.

Sobhraj, who had entered with precious gems concealed in his body and was experienced in bribing captors, was living comfortably in jail.

He turned his trial into a spectacle, hiring and firing lawyers at will, bringing in his recently paroled brother André to assist, and eventually going on a hunger strike.

Leclerc was found guilty of drugging the French students but was later paroled and returned to Canada when she developed ovarian cancer.

Because of Neville's hippie trail connections, Random House offered him a contract to go to Delhi to research the case, even though he and Clarke, both journalists in New York City, had no experience in crime reporting.

[28] Although Sobhraj had freely talked to Neville and Clarke about his murders, he later denied everything he had told them, and pretended his actions were in retaliation against "Western imperialism" in Asia.

[17][13] Sobhraj's prison sentence in India was due to end before the 20-year Thai statute of limitations expired, ensuring his extradition and almost certain execution for murder in Thailand.

Inspector Madhukar Zende of the Bombay Police apprehended Sobhraj in O'Coqueiro Restaurant in Goa; his prison sentence was extended by ten years, just as he had hoped.

On 20 August 2004, Sobhraj was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Kathmandu district court for the 1975 murder of Connie Jo Bronzich.

His lawyer announced that Chantal Compagnon, Sobhraj's wife in France, was filing a case before the European Court of Human Rights against the French government for refusing to provide him with any assistance.

In 2008, Sobhraj announced his engagement to a Nepali woman, Nihita Biswas, who later participated in the reality show Bigg Boss.

[32] On 7 July 2008, issuing a press release through his fiancée Biswas, Sobhraj claimed he was never convicted of murder by any court, and asked the media not to refer to him as a serial killer.

They further claimed that it was not a wedding but part of the ongoing Dashain festival when elders put the vermilion mark on the foreheads of those younger than them to signify their blessings.

On 18 September 2014, Sobhraj was convicted in the Bhaktapur district court of the 1975 murder of Canadian tourist Laurent Carrière, and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

[47] An eight-part BBC-commissioned miniseries called The Serpent was broadcast in the UK in January 2021, starring Tahar Rahim as Sobhraj, before being streamed on Netflix in April 2021.

[48][49] Netflix released Black Warrant based on a book by the same name in January 2025 where Sidhant Gupta played the role of Charles Sobhraj.