2 teenage Dalit sisters found hanging from tree in UP's Lakhimpur Kheri

The bodies of two minor sisters, aged around 15 and 17 years, belonging to the scheduled caste community were found hanging from a tree under the Nighasan police station limits of Lakhimpur Kheri district on Wednesday evening. Local villagers and the girls' family accused three men of rape and murder and staged a demonstration at the Nighasan crossing, a few kilometres from the village.

Lucknow range inspector general (IG) of police Laxmi Singh and Lakhimpur Kheri superintendent of police (SP) Sanjiv Suman, to the protest site to assure villagers that strict action will be taken against the accused.

The senior police officers assured the villagers that the police will work out the case quickly and urged the villagers to call off their road-block and cooperate with the post-mortem examination.

Locals said the bodies of the two girls were found hanging from a tree at Tamoliapurwa village in a sugarcane field with a scarf.

The mother of the girls told reporters that she suspected her daughters were murdered. She alleged that three youngsters of the neighbouring village on a bike abducted the two girls from near a hutment while the two sisters were cutting fodder.

The mother said, "I was bathing inside the hutment when three youths of the neighbouring village arrived, one in a yellow T-shirt, another in a white one and the third in a blue T-shirt."

The incident is a grim reminder of Budaun incident when bodies of two Dalit sisters were found hanging from a tree in a village in 2014. Later, the allegations of gang rape and murder of two teenage girls was investigated by Central Bureau of Investigation.

Lakhimpur Kheri district has witnessed similar incidents of crime against women in the past. Three minor girls were raped and murdered in different parts of the district between August 14 and September 3, 2020.

In June 2011, 11 policemen, including a police inspector, were suspended after the body of a teenage girl was found hanging from a tree on the compound of the Nighasan police station of the district. Later, a CBI court on February 28, 2020 awarded life imprisonment to constable Atiq Ahmad for murdering the 14-year-old girl and hanging her body to make it appear as a suicide case. The court awarded five years' imprisonment to retired deputy SP Inayat-Ullah Khan, who was posted as circle officer of Nighasan at the time of the incident. The constable was his gunner. The retired deputy SP was found guilty of concealing evidence related to the crime and protecting the constable.