
NEW DELHI: A 28-year-old woman strangled her six-day-old daughter to death, packed her body in a bag, and threw it on the roof of an adjacent building of her house in the Dwarka area of the city, an official said on Saturday.
The woman, identified as Shivani, who had now been arrested told the cops that she was facing social stigma for repeatedly giving birth to only girls. It was her fourth daughter who she smothered to death. Two of them had already expired due to some ailment.
Sharing details of the sensational case, DCP (West) Vichitra Veer said a PCR call was received at 5.30 am on Friday at Khyala police station regarding the disappearance of a six-day-old baby girl after which senior officers along with other staff of Khyala police station immediately rushed to the spot.
"On initial inquiry, Shivani (mother of the missing infant) told us that she got discharged from the hospital the previous night and had come to her parental house. She slept with baby by her side after feeding her around 2-2:30 am, and when she woke up around 4:30 am, the baby was missing," the DCP said.
Sensing the gravity of the matter, the cops immediately swung into action, a team was formed which began checking the CCTV cameras of the area.
While a massive search operation was on, Shivani told the police that she needed to go to the hospital to get the stitches removed. "It seemed a bit odd, but considering the medical condition, the police did not stop her," the DCP said.
As the search operation continued, the cops saw a bag lying on the terrace of the adjacent house. When they opened it, the infant girl was found. She was rushed to the hospital, but, the medics declared her dead on arrival.
With cops already suspecting strange behaviour of the mother, suspicions arose further after the recovery of the child following which a team was immediately dispatched to the hospital where Shivani had gone to remove her stitches.
She was immediately taken into custody and put through thorough questioning during which she broke down and confessed to murdering her child.
On further interrogation, the accused mother of the dead infant told the cops that it was her fourth girl child.
"She was facing a lot of social stigma because of that. While feeding the child, she got overawed by these thoughts and smothered/strangulated her, and then threw it on the adjacent roof," the officer said.
The accused Shivani further revealed that she could not sleep after committing the horrific act and wasn't sure what to tell the family members. Hence she told them that the child was missing.
The officer said that they had registered a case of murder and placed the accused Shivani under arrest. "However, to verify her version and to ascertain the exact cause of death, we need to wait until the postmortem of the body, which will be conducted today," he said.