india

Updated: Nov 09, 2019 00:23 IST

A six-old-year girl, who came to attend a wedding with her parents, was allegedly raped and murdered on Thursday night in Andhra Pradesh’s Chittoor district, the police said.

The body of the girl with her clothes partly removed and scratches on her face and other parts was found in the bushes behind the wedding hall in Korabalakota town under B Kothakota block in the district at around 6am on Friday.

Mudivedu sub-inspector of police M Sukumar said while speaking to HT that the girl and her parents, who hail from B Kothakota town, came to the wedding in Korabalakota on Thursday evening.

“The girl was seen with her parents until 10pm. Later, she went missing and her parents thought she must be playing somewhere in the crowd. When they could not find her even after the function was over, they started searching for her,” Sukumar said.

When their search turned out to be futile, they lodged a complaint with the Mudivedu police.

“We also searched for the girl and early in the morning, we could notice the body of the girl in the bushes behind the function hall,” the sub-inspector said.

Her parents told the police that during the wedding, they had noticed a young man taking her pictures on his mobile phone.

“We are going through the closed-circuit television (CCTV) camera footage. We also pressed into service clues team and dog squads to look for the accused,” Sukumar said.

The parents also told the police that some empty liquor bottles were also found close to their daughter’s body.

“Prima facie, it appears she was strangulated to death. We have sent the body to the government hospital at Madanapalle for post mortem. Only then will we able to tell whether the girl was sexually assaulted before being murdered,” Sukumar said.