Accused gestured to my daughter, she went as she knew him: Father of minor raped and killed in Greater Noida

In a narrow lane in a Greater Noida village, 20-odd men sat on Sunday afternoon. Among them was the father of a six-year-old girl who was allegedly kidnapped, raped and murdered on Friday by a man the family had known for years.

Police had killed the accused in an encounter on Saturday night. The father, who runs a family-owned business, said he had seen the girl last on Friday afternoon. “She was playing outside. But when I came out to check on her, she was not there.

We searched for her everywhere, but in vain,” he said. Family members and neighbours of the child approached the police on Friday evening. Officers scanned footage from a CCTV camera near the entrance to the lane in which the child was playing.

Police said they spotted a man, who was later identified as a friend of a relative of the child. “We saw him in the CCTV footage. Usne bachchi ko ishara kiya kuchh gali ke baahar se. (He gestured to the girl from a distance.) He was a familiar face, so she went with him,” the girl’s father said.

On Saturday morning, police reached the house of the child’s relative where the man in the footage lived on rent, an officer said. They apprehended him, but they did not know then what had happened to the little girl. After questioning the suspect, police found the girl’s body near a pond in the village in the afternoon.

“They took him to the pond next to farmland. He would still not tell them where he had dumped my daughter’s body. Later, he broke down and revealed the exact spot, after which her body was retrieved,” the father said, crying.

Police said the accused was questioned after the body was recovered. He allegedly confessed to killing the girl using a knife after raping her, police said. He hid the body in some shrubs about 6-7 km away, they said. Deputy Commissioner of Police (Central Noida) Shailendra Kumar Singh said: “On Saturday night, he was taken to the area [where he had dumped the body] for the second time.

The knife he used to kill the girl was recovered from the shrubs at his instance.” “While coming back, he pushed an officer, took out a pistol he had hidden in the bushes there and fired at the police team. One of the officers sustained a gunshot injury.

Police fired in retaliation, and the accused was hit by a bullet. He was rushed to a nearby hospital where he was declared dead,” DCP Singh said. A police officer said that the accused sustained the injury in his chest, which proved fatal.

The injured police officer is under treatment, police said. Talking about the victim’s relative, a police officer said, “We are still looking for him… His role is yet to be ascertained.”