A 19-year-old girl was smothered with a pillow by her brothers Tohid and Danish for reportedly having a love affair with a youth whom the latter did not approve of. The purported honour killing happened in the wee hours of Thursday, November 3 in the Islam Nagar locality of Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh.
Based on a complaint filed by the deceased’s boyfriend, the police filed an FIR under section 302 of the IPC and detained the brothers and their mother for questioning. The brothers Tohid and Danish reportedly confessed to their crime. The police have also arrested the mother named Samsidha.
Notably, the perpetrators were identified as Tauheed and Moheed in a report by the Hindi newspaper Dainik Bhaskar. According to the report, the brothers learned that the victim was planning to elope with her boyfriend and marry him in court. They were infuriated over this and killed her in the early hours of Thursday.
आज समय करीब 10.15 बजे थाना कोतवाली नगर पुलिस को सूचना प्राप्त हुई कि एक युवती का शव उसके स्वयं के मकान में पडा हुआ है। स्थानीय पुलिस द्वारा शव को कब्जे में लेकर पंचनामा भर पोस्टमार्टम हेतु भेजा गया है। आवश्यक विधिक कार्यवाही की जा रही है।
— GHAZIABAD POLICE (@ghaziabadpolice) November 3, 2022
वीडियो बाइट – SP City 1@Uppolice pic.twitter.com/25A3h15GGJ
Audio clips wherein a deceased woman seeks help goes viral
Meanwhile, two audio clips, allegedly recorded by the woman before her death, are also being widely shared on social media since Wednesday. In one of those clips, the woman is heard repeatedly seeking help from her male friend and telling him that the family members “have brought an injection”.
“I am repeatedly seeking help from you. He has brought an injection for me… you have to finalize the matter; things are getting complicated. I will not be able to call you further…,” the woman is heard saying in the audio clip.
The other audio clip depicts a ruckus in the house and a woman crying and asking her brother to leave her alone. Another woman’s voice can be heard warning the woman that she has brought dishonour to the family and threatening to choke her.
According to Nipun Agarwal, superintendent of police (city 1) quoted by TOI, “the police received information about the death of the woman on Thursday morning and a team reached her house. She is aged 19 years as per identification documents. The family was preparing to perform her last rites but we sent the body for a post-mortem examination, which was in progress till Thursday evening. This entire procedure is being videographed. The sister of the deceased woman told us that her brothers killed the woman.”
“The two older brothers of the deceased woman were picked up for questioning and they admitted that they suffocated her with a pillow. We have called the friend of the deceased, a 24-year-old man and resident of Dasna Gate in Ghaziabad, for questioning. The audio clips getting circulated on social media will also be investigated in due course. We are awaiting the autopsy report and will ask the woman’s friend to submit a police complaint,” the SP added.
Ghaziabad woman suffocated to death by her brother after mother overhears that she is planning to elope
As per the police, the victim girl was in a relationship with a youth from Dasna. The boy detailed the events leading up to her suspected murder in his complaint. He told cops that at about 9 pm on Wednesday, he received a phone call from the girl pleading for help. “She asked me to rescue her from the house as her brothers and mother would kill her. I thought, how can a mother kill her daughter? But at 3.19 am on Thursday, she again called me and said her brother and mother are coming upstairs and they will kill her. She also said they were beating her for the last three days. At 3.31 am, her family members killed her,” the youth said in his complaint.
According to a senior police officer who is part of the investigating team, the victim had a basic feature phone. “Between 8.30 pm and 9 pm on Wednesday, she was talking to her male friend and her mother overheard that they were planning to elope on Thursday night. Samsidha told her sons. After that, they told her to break up with the boy and not talk to him again. She refused.”
It was a family of 7 that lived in the Kaila Bhatta house. The victim’s father Nanne Khan, a former contractor in the construction sector has been paralysed for the last two years. Her younger sister was at home at the time of the incident, police sources said.
The family pretended that the girl died after an illness
According to the police, the family at first tried to pass off the death as a natural one. They told the cops that the girl died due to a ‘throat infection.’
though the family of the victim had tried to pass off the death as a result of a mysterious throat infection, their claims were soon busted. The police stopped the family from rushing the last rites and sent the body for postmortem examination. The case of suspected honour killing is now under investigation.
