Honour killing: Brothers strangle sister to death in UP's Gautam Budh Nagar district

According to the official, the accused brothers used to doubt their deceased sister’s character as she was not living with her husband due to some marital issues between the couple.

NEW DELHI: In a shocking case of honour killing, two brothers allegedly strangled their 30-year-old married sister to death in Gautam Budh Nagar district of Uttar Pradesh. They dumped her body in a river as they were offended by the fact that their sister used to drink alcohol and was, according to them, loose in her character.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (Central Noida) Rambadan Singh said a body of a woman was found floating in Hindon river on March 13 after which the police began probing the matter. “Prima facie it looked like a case of murder and the post-mortem report of the woman also proved it,” the DCP said.

Next day on March 14, a man named Sartaj lodged a missing complaint of her sister at Surajpur police station. The police were apprehensive that the body of the woman found could be Sartaj’s sister and later on, it was confirmed by him as well. The woman was identified as Najma (30), the wife of Sajid, however, she was not residing with her husband.

During further investigation of the case, the police thoroughly questioned the family members of the deceased woman, including her two brothers named Sartaj and Shahrukh. “On sustained interrogation of Sartaj and Shahrukh, the duo admitted killing their sister by strangling her to death with her Dupatta in the dead night of March 8. Later they took her body in a car and after finding an abandoned place threw her in the Hindon river,” the senior official said.

According to the official, the accused brothers used to doubt their deceased sister’s character as she was not living with her husband due to some marital issues between the couple. “They were even offended by the fact that she used to drink alcohol,” the official said. Apart from the prestige issue, the accused duo were also planning to usurp her property.

Notably, two years back the government had informed the Lok Sabha that 145 incidents of “honour killing,” including 50 in Jharkhand, were reported throughout the country from 2017 to 2019. As per data compiled by the National Crime Records Bureau for the year 2021, as many as 32 cases of honour killing were recorded with a maximum of  eight cases each being reported from Jharkhand and Punjab.

Accused planned to usurp sister’s property
According to the official, the accused brothers used to doubt their deceased sister’s character as she was not living with her husband due to some marital issues between her and her husband. “They were even offended by the fact that she used to drink alcohol,” the official said. Apart from this, the accused were also planning to usurp her property. Body of the woman was found floating in Hindon river on March 13.