A panchayat dream and a daughter’s murder Premium

A girl’s body was found in the Nizam Sagar distributary canal in Telangana’s Nizamabad; police say girl’s father killed her, his firstborn, so that his wife could contest panchayat election; Under Maharashtra’s rules, candidates with more than two children cannot contest local elections and the couple had three.

On the afternoon of January 29, Mustaq Ahmed, head constable of the Yedapally police station in Telangana’s Nizamabad, and Mohan, a constable, were questioning residents about a land dispute, when they received a call informing them that a girl had been washed away in the Nizam Sagar distributary canal. The waterway ran just a stone’s throw from the ARP camp in Yedapally mandal, off the Nizamabad-Bodhan National Highway 63.

Ahmed says they immediately kick-started their bike and set off. “When we reached the spot, we saw rescuers laying the body of the girl on the bund side,” he recalls.

The girl, sporting a glittery bindi on her forehead, seemed to be about 5-6 years old. Barring a contusion on her forehead, she did not seem to have any other injuries. The policemen observed that unlike in most drowning incidents they had probed, the body showed no signs of bloating. “She had died just a few minutes earlier. We felt guilty that we could not save her,” Ahmed says.

The duo made some quick inquiries. They found that an 18-year-old man, P. Pawan Kalyan, was standing near the small bridge over the canal and speaking to a friend on the phone when he noticed the girl being swept away in the canal.

“Kalyan said he shouted for help,” Ahmed says. “Venkatesh, an auto driver who was nearby, rushed to the spot on hearing him yell. By then, the girl had apparently been swept further away.”

Venkatesh did not give up. He rode his bike along the bund’s mud road and, after nearly 300 metres, jumped into the canal’s 3-foot-deep stream near a small gate. He caught the girl and pulled her out with the help of others. She was unresponsive and had no pulse.