Two days after siblings found dead in Karnal canal, man held for murder

A day after the bodies of two minor sisters were fished out of the Western Yamuna Canal in Karnal, police arrested a man for murder.

Two days after the bodies of two minor sisters were fished out of the Western Yamuna Canal in Karnal, police arrested a man for murder.

The girls, aged 15 and 12, had gone missing on July 24, and their family had alleged that they had been murdered. (Representative Image/HT File)

The girls, aged 15 and 12, had gone missing on July 24, and their family had alleged that they had been murdered. The accused, Bilal of Gangoh, was sent to two-day police remand.

Karnal deputy superintendent of police Mukesh Kumar said the accused knew the 15-year-old victim and had taken selfies with her, which were saved in a pen drive. The accused had also called the victim on July 24, after which the two girls went missing. An official said it is yet to be determined whether the accused murdered the girls or abetted them to die by suicide.

Initially, unidentified persons had been booked for abduction, but after the girls’ bodies were recovered Section 302 (murder) and sections of the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, were added to the FIR.

It is being probed whether the victims had been sexually assaulted, officials said.