A teenage girl was on Wednesday beheaded with a sharp weapon by her spurned lover, an engineering student from Jamshedpur, on the campus of Ranchi’s illustrious St Xavier’s College.
Khushbu Kumari was murdered in the presence of her mother within minutes of emerging from the examination hall. She was attacked with a short, heavy dagger, known locally as a bhujali, by Vijendra Prasad close to the college principal’s office on Wednesday afternoon, according to eyewitnesses and the police. He was arrested after futile efforts at escape.
The attack was so severe that the girl’s head was separated from her body with a single strike on the nape. A group of college students playing on a nearby playground rushed to the spot after hearing loud shrieks from eyewitnesses and found the girl’s decapitated body in a pool of blood. The boys swiftly caught Prasad despite his trying to frighten them with the blood-stained weapon. He was then beaten up and handed over to the police.
Kumari, an I.Sc. student at Ranchi Women’s College, had come to St Xavier’s for the examinations. Originally from Jamshe-dpur, she had been living at her grandparents’ house in Ranchi’s Tupudana area.
Police sources said Prasad had been Kumari’s boyfriend for quite some time but had become estranged lately after she spurned his repeated proposals of marriage. Prasad, currently being treated for injuries sustained during his capture, reportedly refused to answer questions from the police, saying he would “tell everything” only in court and would like to be jailed for his crime.