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News of Jan
4, 2007
All That Remains of Their Daughter :
A Stained Stole
By
Prashant K. Nanda
Nithari
(Uttar Pradesh), Jan 4
Aloki Halder has been eating only once a day, barely sleeping and
always pining for her 12-year-old daughter who vanished one forenoon
from here 22 months ago. Each single day since that heart-wrenching
March 15, 2005, Aloki has prayed endlessly for the safe return of
Bina, who used to assist the mother in sweeping and mopping scores
of middle class homes in the vicinity.
The gods proved unkind.
Last week, Aloki, her tea vendor husband Gopal Halder and their
18-year-old son Raja were shown a stained stole Bina was wearing
when she went missing - found in a drain behind a businessman's
bungalow in Noida's Sector 31, along with the skeletal remains of
several missing kids from poor families.
As a gruesome and almost unbelievable story of India's most macabre
crime saga, complete with horrific details of what the businessman
Moninder Singh Pandher and his domestic aide Surendra did to scores
of kids they lured one by one has unveiled, the Halders are a
shattered couple.
It is a miracle they can still stand on two legs.
"People come and go away after listening to our story. Only a father
who has lost his daughter knows what his suffering is," Gopal Halder
murmured, speaking so softly in Bengali-laced Hindi that one has to
make an effort to hear him.
"Now we will have to live with the pain of having lost Bina for the
rest of our lives."
At least Gopal talks. Aloki doesn't. "Don't ask me anything, I don't
know anything," was all she spoke to an IANS correspondent. "I only
want my daughter back."
As the Halders unburdened themselves, some 40 people gathered in and
outside the one-room cemented structure that also serves as a
kitchen, hearing a story they have heard over and over again.
Most residents of this semi-urban village form a proletarian army
that keeps the homes and vehicles of the affluent neighborhood in
good shape, in return for meager wages.
Even amid the uncertainty that rules their lives, they had not
bargained for the blood-soaked disaster that hit an estimated 38
children from the village who have gone missing from the start of
2005.
Police say at least 20 of them are now confirmed dead, killed
allegedly by a sadistic Moninder and Surendra in the former's
bungalow, the remains flung into a drain. The full story of why they
were butchered is still not clear.
Gopal Halder recounted the frustrating months that followed the day
his wife left the girl some 200 meters from the village and went
back to finish pending work in the neighborhood. Bina never reached
home. No one saw her.
Moninder Singh's bungalow is located not far away. But in those
months no one suspected a link to the disappearance. India's most
shameful crime was then only beginning.
The distraught parents rushed to their village in West Bengal's
Murshidabad village to find out if Bina went back. Drawing a blank,
they returned to Nithari and approached the police who were
reluctant to register a complaint.
"Eventually they registered a complaint but never game me a copy,"
the father recalled. "Worse, the police kept taunting me saying my
daughter must have eloped with somebody.
"If that was the case, she would be alive and I could have seen her
again one day. Now I have to live with this pain. Now that we have
identified her clothes from the drain, we have no hope of seeing her
alive."
Raja, the brother who was deeply attached to Bina, has stopped
smiling. Even when she tries to sleep, the mother keeps murmuring
Bina's name. "Whenever that happens, we try to console her.
"I used to tell my wife that one day we will get justice, if not
from the cops, then from god.
"We are poor people. We still have faith in god. We only want the
police to hand over Moninder and Surendra to us. We want to hang
them in front of everyone."
IANS
News of Jan
4, 2007
Nithari Killings: Two Top Cops Suspended,
Six Dismissed
Central
Government Panel to Probe Nithari Killings
Parents of Dead Nithari Kids are Given
Money
Moninder Pandher: A Disturbed Childhood
Serial Killer's House Ransacked
Serial Killers Derive Sadistic Pleasure: Experts
Police Chief Admits 'Laxity' over Serial
Killings
Skeletons of 17
Children Found, 9 Identified
Children's Killer Preyed on Victims for Two
Years
Police Did Not Act Because We Were Poor
Noida Police Unearth More Skeletons
Crime Against Children On The Rise in India
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