Eighteen severed body parts, including two headless torsos and limbs that had been stuffed into two suitcases, were found in a river under a bridge in western Bihar’s Kaimur district on Sunday, police said on Monday.
The gruesome discovery was made around 10 am on Sunday when locals, alerted by a foul stench emanating from under the bridge along the Mohania-Chausa National Highway, spotted two torsos floating in the water. When they went closer, they also spotted two blue suitcases with severed limbs and body parts.
A child, believed to be 10-12 years old, is believed to be one of the two victims.
Police said the suitcases possibly opened when they were thrown into the Durgawati River.
Police said they retrieved 18 body parts of two individuals from different sections of the river by the end of the operation, which continued for hours. The nails of one of the severed hands bore traces of nail polish.
“The criminals probably had dumped the heads at another location”, a police officer said.
Senior district police officers, including superintendent of police (SP) Hari Mohan Shukla and teams from the Forensic Science Lab, District Intelligence Unit and Dog Squad were immediately deployed to assist with the investigation.
Shukla said the manner in which the bodies were dismembered and dumped made it clear that this was a premeditated crime. “They dumped the bodies in the river to destroy the evidence,” he said.
Shukla said there were no reports of missing persons from any police station in the district. However, information regarding missing persons has been requested from the bordering districts in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.
The decomposed torsos, along with the severed limbs of two individuals, are being sent to FSL Patna for forensic examination and to help with the identification.
Source: HT
