5-year-old survives alleged attack by father, helps solve sister’s murder in Pune forest
According to the Pune Rural Police, the murder was fuelled by domestic distress and financial instability.
The Pune Rural police said Babaji Mukne attacked the victims with a hard object on the intervening night of Tuesday and Wednesday. (File Photo) A five-year-old boy survived after he and his three-and-a-half-year-old sister were allegedly strangled and abandoned in a forested area of Junnar in Pune district by their father. While the girl died, the boy later narrated the sequence of events to the police, leading to his father’s arrest.
The police arrested the man identified as Sagar Sadashiv Shinde, 29, a resident of Moshi, and recovered the body of his daughter, Harshada.
The Pune Rural police registered a First Information Report (FIR) in this case at the Alephata Police Station Wednesday. “A court has remanded the accused to police custody till May 12. Further investigation is on,” Vishwas Jadhav, Inspector, Alephata Police Station, said.
According to the police, Shinde’s wife left him a few months ago, following some domestic dispute, and lived with his son, Aryan, daughter, and parents in Gaikwad Wasti in Moshi. The police said the man reportedly lost his job at a private company and was struggling to care for his children.
On Tuesday, the police said Shinde took the two children to a forested area in Alekhindi village in Junnar. He allegedly strangled the children and dumped their bodies in the forest areas, believing both had died, and left the place.
On Wednesday morning, his son Aryan gained consciousness and started crying, when some residents from a nearby village saw him and then informed the police. The police reached the spot, took the boy to the Alephata Police Station, and informed his grandfather, who said Aryan’s sister and father were traceable. The grandfather also filed a missing persons report at the Bhosari MIDC police station.
The police launched a search and arrested Shinde from the Chakan area. During interrogation, he confessed to his crime, after which a police team reached the jungle area in Alekhindi with him and recovered his daughter’s body. The body was sent to a hospital for a postmortem examination.
During the investigation, the police found that after the alleged crime, the accused returned home and told his father Wednesday morning that he had rented a room in Chakan where he had kept the children.
The police arrested the accused on charges of murdering his daughter, attempting to kill his son, and trying to destroy evidence.
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