6-year-old killed in Delhi: To cover up ransom plot, man says boy ogled at wife

Police say the suspect kidnapped the child, a neighbour, and tied him up inside a bed box for more than a day with a plan to seek ransom. He later realised he would be caught and decided to kill the boy.

A man allegedly killed a 6-year-old child in Delhi after keeping him tied up inside the storage box of a bed since he could not execute his plan to seek a ransom, police said late on Friday, rejecting the suspect’s previous claim that he killed the child for peeping at his wife as she bathed.

Ramratti holds up a photograph of her 6-year-old son Umesh, who was abducted and killed by a neighbour who initially planned to seek a ransom of Rs 20,000. (Raj K Raj/HT)

Rohit Prasad was arrested on Friday morning after neighbours broke open one of his rooms to investigate a stench that came from the rotting body. He initially told police, according to senior officers, that he killed the child in a fit of rage for peeping at his wife and passing lewd comments when she bathed.

“He misled police the entire day and finally accepted that he had kidnapped the child to seek a ransom of Rs 20,000 from his parents,” said Romil Baaniya, DCP (south-east). According to Baaniya, Prasad did not know how to execute the plan and realised the child would identify him eventually, before deciding to strangle the victim.

“He made up the ogling story thinking it would get him off with a lighter punishment,” the DCP said. The victim went missing around 4 pm on Wednesday while playing with friends in his neighbourhood in JJR Camp, Okhla Phase 2. His relatives, neighbours and police searched for him but could not trace him. Neighbours said Prasad led some of the searches, ostensibly to avoid suspicion. It was around 9.30 am on Friday that neighbours sensed a foul smell from a room owned by the suspect.

Prasad later told the police that he had kept the boy inside the box for around 24-36 hours before strangling him to death using a pyjama. Earlier in the day, the DCP said that Prasad claimed to have fatally struck the boy in a fit of rage since he would ogle at his wife.