Thirteen days after Aaradhya, a vegetable seller, went missing, and her body was recovered from a drain, police on Thursday worked out the case.
“The crime was committed by a childless couple Sonu Pandit, 40 and his wife Jugnu, 32, in the belief that sacrificing an innocent girl would help them bear a child,” said deputy commissioner of police, West zone, Vishwajeet Srivastava, while addressing newspersons. “While the prime accused Sonu committed suicide after police questioned him, his wife was held on Thursday,” said the DCP.
According to police, the accused couple strangulated the girl, tied the hands and legs with a rope, and later stuffed the body in a box. They also kept the body for a day at their house before dumping it into a drain.
The woman told police that since they were childless, her husband believed that if he sacrificed a child, his virility would remain forever. During interrogation, Jugnu said that hence, her husband first brought home the Class 3 student. Then after performing a puja, he strangled her to death with a sacred thread.
“They tied the hands and legs of the girl, kept the body in a plastic sheet in the cosmetic box kept in the house. Sonu then took the box on his bicycle and threw it in a drain the next day,” a police release read.
How police got a clue
“The rope used to tie the bangle box. The same rope was used to tie the girl to Sonu’s bicycle. The rope was found during a search of Sonu’s house.
“After the police confiscated Sonu’s phone, and went through it, they found he had texted someone not to call him as he suspected that the police had kept his phone under surveillance. He deleted the message, but forgot to delete it from the recycle bin of the phone, confirming the suspicion,” said the DCP.
Connecting these links, the police team took Sonu’s wife Jugunu into custody, then she confessed to the murder,” said the police.
‘She used to run an RD of ₹100 a day’
Aaradhya’s father, Chhote Lal, said, “ The financial condition of my house is not good. That’s why Aaradhya had grown older than her age. To contribute to the expenses, she used to make polythene packets and sell vegetables in the surrounding area. We used to deposit 100 rupees a day from her earnings in RD. The remaining money was used to run the household expenses.
