Decomposed body found stuffed in bag in Ghazipur

The condition of the body was making it difficult not only to identify the victim but also their gender.

A badly decomposed body stuffed in a plastic bag wrapped with brown tape was found in the Hindon canal in East Delhi’s Ghazipur, police said on Sunday, in what appears to be a case of murder. The condition of the body was making it difficult not only to identify the victim but also their gender.

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Police believe the body is nearly a month old and of a person aged between 30 and 40. Long hair found on the body suggests that the victim could be a woman, police said, adding, however, that a final determination could only be made after an autopsy. The examination is also critical to determine the cause of death.

As per police, the body will be kept in the mortuary for at least 72 hours for identification purpose before the police will decide on getting the autopsy done.

Police said that they are also trying to ascertain if the murder happened in Delhi or if the body in the bag travelled to the city from Uttar Pradesh through the Hindon canal. The body was discovered on Saturday evening by rag pickers in the area.

Deputy commissioner of police (east) Abhishek Dhania said that, on Sunday evening, the Ghazipur police station received a call about the discovery of a human body near Hindon canal, opposite Mulla Colony in Ghazipur. A police team reached the spot and learnt that ragpickers, who had been collecting garbage from near the canal, had spotted the plastic bag. When they opened it, a foul stench emerged, leading them to raise an alarm and alert local residents. The call informing the police was made by one of the residents.

“The police personnel opened the bag and found a badly decomposed human body, the skeleton of which was visible. The body was wrapped with brown tape. It looked nearly a month old. The area where the body in the bag was found was cordoned off and forensic experts collected important evidence for further investigation,” said DCP Dhania.

The DCP said that a case against unknown persons has been registered under sections 103 (murder) and 238 (causing disappearance of evidence of the offence) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) at the Ghazipur police station. Investigation has been taken up to ascertain the identity of the deceased and the circumstances surrounding the incident. Investigators were also preparing a list of people, especially women, who had gone missing in Delhi-National Capital Region (NCR) in the past one month.