Villagers set fire to police outpost in West Bengal after 9-year-old girl’s rape-murder

5 oct 2024

Hours after a nine-year-old girl was allegedly raped and murdered in a village in West Bengal’s South 24 Parganas district, violence broke out in the area on Saturday morning as angry villagers set a police outpost on fire, alleging inaction on the local police’s side. The police denied the allegations saying that one person had been arrested in the case.

According to the girl’s family and neighbours, she had gone to a coaching center on Friday afternoon. When she failed to return home, her family started searching for her. When they failed to locate her, they approached the police to report her missing. The local police, however, directed them to file a complaint at another police station, the family alleged.  On Friday night, when the girl’s body was found in a nearby pond, tension rose in the area.