On Saturday, September 3, the body of a 22-year-old youth was found hanging from a tree in Uttar Pradesh’s Bareilly district. The deceased, identified as Sunil Kumar, was killed over an alleged love affair with a girl from the Muslim community. Sunil Kumar’s body was found hanging from a mango tree in a field near his house in Jianagla village in Bareilly. His mouth was gagged and his hands and legs were tied with a rope.
According to the reports, the Muslim girl’s family, particularly her father and brothers, were opposed to their inter-religious affair. Enraged over their relationship, the girl’s father and brothers allegedly kidnapped Sunil Kumar and assaulted him before killing him by hanging him from a tree.
The father of the deceased has lodged a complaint against the girl’s brothers Mohammad Fazal, Mohammad Yasin, Abrar Ahmed, and Sarfaraz Ahmed, all of whom were residents of the same village. Based on the complaint the Bareilly police have registered a case of murder under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) against the accused and sent the body of the deceased for post-mortem.
According to Sunil Kumar’s father Asha Ram, his son had a love affair with one Nisar Ahmed’s daughter. Nisar Ahmed, a madarsa cleric by profession and a resident of the same village was opposed to their inter-religious affair. In the past, there had been a fight between both families regarding this and Sunil Kumar was threatened by the members of the girl’s family. However, at that time, the village panchayat had intervened and a consensus was reached. Both families agreed that the youth and the girl will not meet ever again.
However, on Friday (September 2), Sunil Kumar went missing from his home. The father said that he had last seen Sunil Kumar sleeping in his room at around 11 pm on Friday, after which he suddenly disappeared. At around 1 am, he received a photo and an audio recording on a Whatsapp group from his son’s mobile.
The father said that in this audio file his son was heard saying, “Leave me. The village head has made the decision, so why are you killing me?
He further alleged that Mohammad Fazal, Mohammad Yasin, Abrar Ahmed, and Sarfaraz Ahmed beat up Sunil Kumar, gagged him, tied his hands and legs and hung him from the tree.
The father further said that the next morning at around 6 am, when his neighbour Ramdhun went to water his field, he saw a dead body hanging from a tree and immediately informed the village sarpanch about the same. The villagers who rushed to the spot, identified the body to be that of Sunil Kumar.
Additional SP Rajkumar Agarwal, meanwhile, confirmed that the police have registered a case against 5 people and detained the girl’s brothers Mohammad Fazal, Mohammad Yasin, Abrar Ahmed and two others.
“The body has been sent for post-mortem,” said the Additional SP, adding, “We have taken into account the viral pictures and an audio message for investigation.” In this case, it was told that the girl’s family wanted to take revenge on the boy. The boy’s uncle Harbhajan told the police, “my nephew was killed because of his girlfriend. His father, uncle and brother are all involved in the murder.”
In a similar incident, on August 29, Basti Police (Uttar Pradesh) arrested two brothers identified as Irfan and Irshad and their cousin Israr for murdering a 19-year-old Hindu boy Ankit as he allegedly was in a relationship with their sister Ameena Khatun. The sister was also found dead under mysterious circumstances, as per reports.
The incident took place at Padriya Chet Singh village in Ruthauli Police Station area on August 26, and the dead body of the deceased Hindu boy was found the next day. The arrests were made following the post-mortem of Ankit that confirmed he was killed by strangulation.
