16-year-old girl set ablaze by her lover, dies at AP's Kadapa hospital, accused held

TIRUPATI: The 16-year-old girl who was set ablaze by her lover at an isolated spot inside the forest area in Gopavaram mandal near Badvel on Saturday, died while undergoing treatment at the Rajiv Gandhi institute of medical sciences at Kadapa on Sunday morning.The accused responsible for the girl's gruesome death was nabbed by the Kadapa police in the late hours on Saturday.Kadapa SP V Harshavardhan Raju told reporters that the accused identified as Vignesh befriended the victim Dasthagiramma in their childhood and the duo fell in love. However, Vignesh, who works as a chef at a local hotel at Kadapa, dumped Dasthagiramma and married another girl, who is said to be pregnant now.When Dasthagiramma kept on pressurising Vignesh to marry her, the accused hatched a plan to eliminate her. According to his plan, Vignesh asked Dasthagiramma to meet him on Saturday. When Dasthagiramma took a break from her college and took an autorickshaw to go and meet Vignesh, the latter met her midway and took her to an isolated spot inside the forest area near a private factory on Saturday.Following an altercation with Dasthagiramma, Vignesh pulled out a petrol packet which he brought along and threw it on the victim and set her ablaze, and fled away from the spot.When Dasthagiramma raised an alarm for help, women working at the neighbouring fields, approached her and shifted her to the RIMS hospital with the help of police.The victim, who suffered 80% burns, registered her statement with the magistrate and the police on Saturday, and clearly narrated the sequence of events.Though doctors at the RIMS hospital tried their best to revive the victim, she died while undergoing treatment at the hospital at around 5 am on Sunday.Meanwhile, following the instructions of Chief minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu, the four police teams constituted by the Kadapa district police wing, arrested Vignesh late on Saturday night.Family members and relatives of the accused as well as various women organizations, demanded capital punishment for the accused, who executed a premeditated murder and killed the 16-year-old girl in a brutal manner by setting her ablaze.