Chandigarh: In a shocking incident, a "poverty-stricken" migrant labourer and his wife killed their three minor daughters and stuffed their bodies in a trunk in their house in Muqsudan locality of Punjab’s Jalandhar district, police said on Monday.
The incident came to light after the police found the bodies of three girls, aged between nine and four years, from a trunk from inside their parents’ house in the locality during its search.
The couple had on Sunday reported to police that their daughters, namely, Amrita, 9, Sakshi, 7, and Kanchan, 4, were missing since morning.
Accused Couple filed missing complaint
The police said that the couple had informed police that their daughters who were playing in the locality’s street had not returned till 11 pm on Sunday.
However, when the police started investigating, searched the locality and talked to people, it was learnt that the girls were at home only since morning and had not come out.
Getting suspicious, the police also got to know from CCTV footage that nowhere were the girls seen outside in the locality and hence, the searched inside the house and found the girls’ bodies stuffed inside a trunk.
Parents kill their daughters due to lack of money
Stating that the migrant couple, Sushil Mandal and Meenu, both daily-wagers, had been arrested, the police said that they had also admitted during the interrogation that they killed their daughters as they could not bear their expenses.
They said they had five children including three daughters and had taken their younger siblings, a boy, 2 and one-and-a-half-year old girl with them to their work on that day.
According to police, the migrant labourer couple said it was because of the abject poverty that they poisoned the milk given to the daughters and made up a story for police that they had gone missing.
Stating that the couple had been arrested, police said more conclusive details from the post mortem report was awaited.
