Children were sexually assaulted and murdered

Muktsar, Jan 10 (UNI) The postmortem report of the four highly decomposed bodies found from an abandoned rice sheller of former Congress MP, Jagmeet Singh Brar last night, has confirmed that the children were sexually assaulted and then brutally murdered.

According to the team of four doctors who conducted the portmortem on the bodies of the children belonging to the migrant Bawaria families at the Guru Gobind Singh Medical College and Hospital at Faridkot today, the cause of death was death due to strangulation. The time of death was about one and a half months back and their bodies were burnt after they were strangulated.

The postmortem also confirmed the identity of the children who had been missing for almost two months.

Speaking to UNI, V K Bhawra, IG Bathinda Range said the children have been identified as Ashki (9) and Ratni (13), both girls and Satbir and Bholi both 10 years of age, after the post mortem was carried out at the Guru Gobind Singh Medical College and Hospital at Faridkot this morning.

A family of rag pickers belonging to the Bawaria community from Pothi Kalan village had on Novermebr 14 last year registered a complaint with the police that four of their childern, two girls Ratni and Ashki and two boys Satbir and Bholi, were missing.

Mr Bhawra said a DDR was entered by the police on the complaint of the parents and the missing report was flashed on the local TV Channels and newspapers.

Some people, including a woman belonging to Bawaria tribe hailing from the Ratia area of Haryana, named by the missing children's families were questioned by the police and raids carried out throughout last night and today, he said.

However, nobody has been arrested so far, Mr Bhawra said.

A four-member SIT has been set up under SSP G Nageshwar Rao to probe the matter and the forensic team from Chandigarh has also taken the relevant samples, he said .

The parents were present at the time of the post mortem and the bodies would soon be handed over to the families, the IG said. The Muktsar Sub-Divivsional Magistrate and a DSP had accompanied the dead bodies to Faridkot.

The bodies of children with their hands tied were found by a police patrol party from the deserted rice sheller, which had not been in operation since the last few years. The patrol party had gone to the godown to make arrangements for the stay of police personnel during the coming 'Maghi' mela here.

The incident, coming close on the heels of Noida's Nithari serial killings, has sent shockwaves in the state poised for assembly polls next month.

The firebrand Congress campaigner, Mr Brar, when contacted stated that the rice mill owned by his family, had been closed for the last five years. He said that the matter should be thoroughly investigated adding that he would fully cooperate with the police.

Commenting on the political ramifications of the matter, Mr Brar admitted that he even had rivals within the Congress party iteself and stressed that he would like the truth to come out.

''How can I stop people from making it a poll issue'', he added.

Meanwhile, arch-rival Shiromani Akali Dal's general secretary Sukhbir Singh Badal, representing the Faridkot Parliamentary constituency while saying that the sensitive issue must not be politicised, alleged that the matter could be related to the Nithari serial killings.

''We have no trust in the Punjab Police so the matter should be probed by the CBI'', he demanded.

UNI