SIT to probe rape, murder of minor girl

MADHUBANI: District magistrate Giribar Dayal Singh on Thursday constituted a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the alleged rape and murder of a 12-year-old girl of Andhramath village under Laukhi block in Phulparas sub-division of the district.

The DM said the SIT, headed by Jhanjharpur SDPO Nidhi Rani, will unravel the mystery surrounding the incident. He said the post mortem found no sign of rape and burning of the body. The post mortem report said the death was caused by asphyxiation, which points to the possibility that the girl was throttled to death, the DM added.

Singh said the post-mortem was done at Begusarai at the request of the members of the victim’s family. The father of the deceased girl, however, said neither he nor anyone else from the family had made any such request to the administration. On confrontation, the DM, however, made a clarification that he had inadvertently made the claim of the post-mortem having been done at Begusarai at the request of the family. He made it clear that the family had only requested for the body to be sent to Begusarai for cremation at Simaria.

According to an FIR lodged by girl’s father with Andhramath police station on May 25, the girl was kidnapped by a motorcycle-borne unknown person around 6.30pm while she was returning home after attending the ‘mehndi’ ceremony of her cousin, Pooja Kumari, whose marriage was scheduled on the following day.

He also mentioned in the FIR that two young boys, Laloo Jha and Pawan Jha, also of the same village, had seen the girl being taken away on the motorcycle by the unknown person as they were standing somewhere near the scene of the incident.

Laloo and Pawan were detained by the police for sometime and later released. It was only after the body of the girl was recovered from Tilyuga river on May 27 that Laloo and Pawan were arrested.