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Children's Killer
Preyed on Victims for Two Years
Noida, Dec 30 (IANS) The
gruesome tale of sexual abuse and serial killing of dozens of
children that has shocked India got even weirder with the discovery
of more skeletal remains and revelations that the main culprit was a
rich businessman from Punjab who preyed on his innocent victims for
almost two years.
Police did not rule out the angle of human organ trading too as
distraught parents of missing children thronged the road in front of
a villa in Noida's Sector 31 from where the skulls were found. The
parents, mostly daily wagers, say the police were callous in their
attitude to the missing person complaints they had filed as they
were poor.
The businessman owner of the house Mohinder Singh and his domestic
help Surendra Kohli, alias Satish, were arrested Friday on charges
of molesting and murdering children.
Police stumbled on the skeletons while investigating the murder of a
girl who was missing from Nithari village, adjoining the area, for
the past six months.
"We have recovered 16 skeletons till now, but the figure could rise
as more skeletal remains are being found from the drain," said
Rajesh Kumar Singh Rathore, senior superintendent of police (SSP)
Noida.
The skeletons are suspected to be of 38 children, between 3-11 years
of age and mostly girls, who had gone missing while playing near a
water tank at Nithari village, a semi-rural village on the edges of
this upscale suburban town, in the past 21 months. The first
kidnapping was reported in March 2005.
"It is too early to reveal the details of the investigations. The
two men would strangle the children, cut them into pieces and bury
the bodies in a two-feet deep ditch behind the house," said the
police official. "We have recovered blades from the house that must
have been used as cutters."
"Both the men have admitted to their crime," added Rathore.
The duo would lure the children into the white-colored two-storeyed
house by offering them sweets.
"A small room on the first floor of the house was used for cutting
the bodies before stacking them in bags and burying them behind the
house," he added.
The 15th skull was recovered at around midnight Friday.
Police believe the two were psychopathic serial killers who would
lure children into the house, sexually abuse and strangle them and
later dump the bodies in a drain behind the house.
Amar Halder, a laborer, sobs holding aloft the photograph of his
11-year-old niece who went missing four months ago. "We always
suspected that someone from the village was involved in the
disappearance of our child but police did not take action even after
repeated complaints. I work in a factory and do not earn enough to
bribe the police. The police only want money from us. Action should
be taken against the policemen," he said.
The indifference of the police to complaints of 38 children going
missing in the area is in sharp contrast to their alertness during
the abduction in November of the three-year-old son of a top
software firm from Noida's elite Sector 15A. The child was returned
five days later after the father reportedly coughed up Rs. 5 million
and the police held an elaborate press conference that was televised
nationally.
Says Sunil Biswas, whose eight-year-old daughter went missing while
plying near the house of Mohinder Singh: "We came to Delhi in search
of work for a better living, and ended losing our children like
this. Police did not take action only because they were the children
of poor families being kidnapped and murdered."
When the parents realized that police were not doing enough to look
for their children, they formed a team themselves to look for the
children.
"We went to Mumbai, Jaipur, Bharatpur, Agra and Kolkata in search of
our children as we suspected that they might have been forced into
the flesh trade," added Biswas, who works as a rickshaw puller in
Noida.
Anil Halder, a daily wage laborer whose 14-year-old daughter never
returned home one day, describing the police apathy, says: "When I
went to report about my missing daughter at the police station, the
officials told me not to bother them as my daughter had fled with
someone. They did not investigate it properly. Had they carried out
proper investigations, the lives of many children would have been
saved."
The village has a population of over 25,000 people, mostly migrants
from West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar who have come in search of
work in the Indian capital and other nearby cities.
According to reports, a doctor accused earlier of organ trade lives
in a house adjacent to the Sector 31 bungalow of Mohinder Singh. The
two houses are connected through a backyard passage, say some
locals.
"While Surendra initially confessed to killing six minor girls and
two boys, sustained interrogation of his employer Mohinder Singh led
to disclosures of the rape and killing of grown up girls too," a
police official said.
Police teams have been sent to Ludhiana to interrogate other members
of Mohinder Singh's family including his wife. His farmhouse near
Chandigarh has been raided in search of other missing girls and
boys.
There was nothing
suspicious about Pandher, say neighbors
Sardar Mohinder Singh
Pandher was known as a successful businessman among neighbors in
Sector 26 of Chandigarh where he lived with his wife and son in a
sprawling bungalow. But that was till Friday.
On Friday Pandher's shocked neighbors came to know through
television news channels that he was arrested by police for his
alleged involvement in abduction, sexual abuse and killing of
possibly dozens of innocent children in Noida, a suburban town of
Delhi.
Pandher, 60, owns a firm - Classified Auto Distributors - that
operates from Sector 9 in Noida. He also owns the house D-5 in
Sector 31 in Noida. The police have recovered skeletons of 16
children, allegedly killed by Pandher and his servant Surendra Kohli
and dumped in a drain near his house.
According to the police, the investigations have so far revealed
that Pandher has a flourishing transport business spread over
Amritsar, Chandigarh, Ludhiana and Jalandhar in Punjab and Noida in
Uttar Pradesh. He is into manufacturing and supply of spare parts of
earthmovers and bulldozers.
Pandher used to be on the move most of the time as he had to travel
to various cities in Punjab to look after his business. "Last time I
had seen him at his residence was about two weeks ago," one of his
neighbors in Chandigarh said.
"He was a friendly person and never created trouble for anyone. We
never found anything suspicious about him," added another neighbor,
who did not want to be named.
Meanwhile, police continued search operations on the second day as
well and remains of 16 children were found by the police till the
second day of the searches.
"We have sent police teams to Ludhiana and Chandigarh to find out
more about the business deals and details about his movements in the
last two to three years," said a senior Noida police official
investigating the case.
"The possibility of involvement of the accused in an organ
transplant racket cannot be ruled out; so we are probing all
possible personal and business links of Pandher. We are checking on
the profiles of his close business associates to find out about
organ transplant racket," he added.
The official said that investigations so far have revealed that
Pandher had no past criminal record.
"There are indications that he is a sick man and these children were
subjected to sexual harassment by him but he was not found involved
in any criminal case in the past," a police official said.
"We have sent teams to question his son and his wife in Chandigarh,"
the official added.
There Was Nothing
Suspicious about Pandher, say Neighbors
Kidney Racket Not Ruled Out in Children's
Killings
Police Did Not Act Because We Were Poor
Noida Police Unearth More Skeletons
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