Mystery shrouds death of missing teenager in city

Jaipur: A 16-year-old girl who went missing Friday after leaving home for a bicycling jaunt was found dead under mysterious circumstances on the first-floor porch of an apartment complex in the city’s Pratap Nagar area Saturday morning.

Police have launched an investigation and are looking at both murder and suicide angles.

Pratap Nagar SHO Puran Mal said the teenager failed to return after leaving home around 7.30pm Friday. “CCTV footage from the apartment complex shows her climbing the stairs and heading straight for the terrace,” he said.

Police said the Class 12 student’s family looked for her throughout the night Friday, gradually expanding the search into neighbouring areas as the hours went by, before finally lodging a missing person report at the Pratap Nagar police station.

Around 8am Saturday, police received information that the body of a girl had been discovered in an apartment complex. Officers rushed to the spot and identified her as the teenager reported missing the previous night.

Police recovered the student’s spectacles and slippers from the building’s terrace, leading them to suspect that she may have died after falling from there onto the first-floor porch. Officials, however, said the cause and circumstances of death will be clear only after a post-mortem and detailed forensic examination.

A Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) team was called to collect evidence from the scene before the body was moved to a hospital mortuary.

“The victim’s family has alleged that she may have been abducted while cycling, but we need to probe all angles,” a senior police officer said.

Police are also investigating how the girl managed to enter the apartment complex unchallenged despite the presence of security guards at multiple points within the premises. Investigators are analysing CCTV footage from surrounding areas to establish how the teenager reached the building and reconstruct the sequence of events leading to her death.

“We are examining CCTV footage and speaking to residents. A medical board has been constituted to conduct the post-mortem,” a senior police officer said.