Mystery of the Badaun girls' deaths: The CBI story

In concluding that the two teenaged girls who were found hanging from a tree in Badaun were not raped and murdered, the Central Bureau of Investigation has deconstructed a chain of events to support its theory.

On the basis of the grilling of main witness Nazru, also a distant relative of the girls, and other villagers, the CBI pieced together the chain of events which led to the alleged suicide as concluded by it.

Badaun sisters committed suicide, were not raped: CBI

Giving the events of May 27 when the girls went missing, CBI sources said that the elder girl had an affair with local boy Pappu while her younger cousin was in the know of it.

Sources said that on May 27 morning, the younger sister called up Pappu from a mobile owned by the family demanding Rs 200 for a visiting a local fair to which the boy agreed and asked the sisters to come to a secluded spot for a meeting.

During the day, the girls went to fair which was to continue for some more days.

In the evening around 9.30, the couple met behind the girls' outhouse in the shield of some hutments while younger sister was on the watch.

The CBI sources claimed that while they were about to enter in amorous activities, they were spotted by Nazru, who got into a scuffle with the boy and threatened to expose the couple as he escaped from the scene.

While girls belonged to a dominant caste in the village with their community constituting about 25 per cent of population, the boy's community was about four per cent.

After the incident, the girls, Pappu and Nazru fled from the scene. Pappu went to his home, while girls hid in fields, they claimed.

Meanwhile, the sources said, Nazru reached the girls house but did not reveal that he spotted them with Pappu. Instead, he raised a false alarm of thieves in the village to mobilise villagers.

"Nazru told us that he knew the action of the couple was consensual. He feared that the girls might put blame on him to save Pappu thus bringing him bad name. So he mobilised the villagers but did not reveal he spotted at the girls with Pappu," a senior CBI official said.

The sources said during the commotion around 9.30 pm, women of the victims' family realised that the girls who had gone on the pretext of relieving themselves, had not returned home.

When this came to light, Nazru allegedly lied and said he saw Pappu forcibly taking the girls.

The family along with other villagers started a massive search operation during which Nazru and one more person went to Pappu's house looking for the girls but did not find them although the boy was at his home with his brothers.

The phones of the girl got switched off at 9.30 pm, while the search was going on, giving a clue to the CBI that they were alive till this time.

The phone was switched on around 11.40 pm for 12 seconds on which, CBI believes, the girls saw several missed calls, panicked and decided to end their lives feeling that their activities have been busted.

During the frantic search operation, one of the villagers around 1 am told the family that he had seen younger girl speaking to someone over phone in the morning for quite some time.

The family brought the phone, which had call recording facility, and listened to conversation in front of 15 people at 1.15 am which showed a friendly conversation with Pappu.

The villagers then approached the police at about two in the wee hours alleging that Pappu had abducted their daughters.

Nazru also told the police that when he had objected, Pappu showed a country made pistol which CBI said was a lie.

The police wanted to question Nazru, but the family and one of the villagers started raising a issue that they are being harassed by police and proceeded to approach higher authorities in Badaun town.

At about five in the morning when they were on the way to Badaun town, they received a call that bodies of the girls have been found hanging from a mango tree.