A love story went horribly wrong on Valentine’s Day eve in Agra, a city that is home to the eternal monument of love. A young Muslim girl was killed by her parents after they found she was having an affair with a Hindu. The girl, 24, was strangulated to death last week and quietly buried by her parents.
When the man learnt of her death, he shot himself dead in the busy marketplace over the weekend.
His death opened the lid on the girl’s murder, with his family members telling the police they had been threatened by the girl’s family, which vehemently opposed an inter-religious alliance. They claimed the girl’s family was trying to get her married to someone from within their community, but the girl told them she would marry according to her wish.
“Both of them were all set to defy her parents and get married. Her father had even threatened my brother,” the man’s sister told the police.
After his death and his sister’s statement, the police exhumed the girl’s body and found strangulation marks on the neck. The post-mortem report confirmed she had been strangulated to death.
The DIG (Agra) told reporters a murder case had been registered against the girl’s family, now absconding.
Abetment to suicide charges were also registered over the man’s death. Crack police teams are tracking down the girl’s parents and hope to arrest them soon.