AHMEDABAD: A woman in Rajkot allegedly confessed to pushing her two-year-and-four-month-old daughter to her death from the fifth floor of a residential complex on October 12, after initially claiming that someone else had thrown the child, police said.
Investigators are probing the alleged motive amid reports of marital discord and the woman’s relationship with another person. The woman had been living with her daughter at her parental home following disputes with her husband and allegedly told police during questioning that she did not want the child because of her relationship with another person.
The girl died on the spot after falling from the building at around 7 pm. The case took a suspected murder turn after the child’s relatives questioned whether she could have climbed over the approximately four-foot-high wall at the spot on her own.
However, her initial account of the incident presented a different picture.
Speaking to the media on October 14, the woman claimed that she was in the bathroom on the evening of October 12 when she heard someone calling, “Mommy, Mommy!” She said she immediately rushed out and began searching for her daughter, asking neighbours whether the little girl was with them. After receiving negative responses, she said, she checked several households on the fourth floor but could not find her.
According to her account, she eventually went to the fifth floor, where residents were discussing a child who had fallen from above. She then took the lift downstairs and discovered that the child was her own daughter.
While recounting the incident, the woman reportedly appeared to faint two or three times and was revived when water was splashed on her face.
Police, however, said their investigation contradicted her initial version of events. They alleged that she had attempted to portray the death as an act committed by an unidentified person before eventually confessing during sustained questioning.
The incident came to light around 7 pm on October 12, when the toddler fell from the fifth floor of the residential complex and died at the scene.
The circumstances surrounding the fall immediately raised questions among family members. The spot from which the child fell had a wall approximately four feet high, prompting relatives to suspect that the toddler could not have climbed over it unaided.
The child’s maternal uncle and other relatives reportedly suspected foul play and questioned whether someone had picked up the girl and thrown her from the building.
Following the incident, personnel from Rajkot’s B Division police station reached the scene and initiated an investigation.
After completing the panchnama, or official documentation of the scene, police sent the child’s body to the Civil Hospital for a forensic post-mortem examination, which was conducted the following morning.
A team led by Police Inspector Chauhan questioned around 15 people, including the child’s mother, family members and neighbours, as investigators attempted to reconstruct the events leading to the death.
A review of the residential complex’s CCTV system, however, yielded no recordings.
“We checked the society’s CCTV cameras, but discovered that no recordings were being made,” PI Chauhan said, explaining one of the challenges facing investigators.
The police investigation also uncovered reports of suspicious activity in the days preceding the child’s death. According to Chauhan, family members and neighbours told investigators that various household items had been thrown into the party plot behind the residential complex over the previous two to three days.
“These included clothes, bedsheets, quilts, footwear and flower pots,” he said.
Investigators are examining this information as part of the broader inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the incident.
Police said the mother initially maintained that another person had thrown the child from the building. However, investigators said her account changed during questioning, after which she allegedly admitted to throwing the toddler herself.
The alleged confession shifted the investigation from a suspected unexplained fall to a case involving the child’s own mother.
Police are now taking steps to have the girl’s father lodge the formal complaint, Chauhan said.
The investigation is continuing to establish the complete sequence of events, verify the alleged motive and determine the circumstances in which the child was killed.