A Class-8 student from Sonepat was allegedly strangled to death by his classmates following a fight over the victim’s cell phone.

The police on Sunday arrested the suspects on the charge of murder. Subham, 14, a student of CRZ Senior Secondary School in Sonepat, had lent his cell phone to one of the suspects a week ago, Sonepat senior superintendent of police (SSP) Arun Singh Nehra said. “The victim had been asking his classmate repeatedly to return the handset. On Friday, one of the suspects asked Subham to meet them at the school’s backyard and collect the cell phone,” the SSP said.

On reaching there, the suspect and his friend strangled Subham with a cable wire to death and hid the body in the bushes near the school’s boundary wall, the police have said.

After Subham failed to return home from school, his family lodged a missing report on Friday. The police recovered his body on Saturday night. The body was handed over to Subham’s family after the post-mortem examination at the Civil Hospital, Sonepat.