Jashpur, Nov 8 (PTI) A 27-year-old man from Chhattisgarh allegedly murdered his cousin’s four-year-old son and removed his kidneys, lungs and eyes in his bid to sell the organs online after being influenced by social media, police said.
The accused, identified as Basudev, alias Tangnu, was arrested on Sunday after the child’s body was found stuffed in a sack and dumped in a pit in a field in Lodhenapath Mahua village of Jashpur district, they said.
The victim’s father, Ramjeet Ram (36), had lodged a complaint at Sanna police station on Saturday, saying his son Jitendra Ram had been missing since November 5, Jashpur Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Lal Umed Singh said.
Ramjeet, who had moved with his family to Sanna village about a year ago for work, lived in a hut near the Aamatchua river dam. The accused, a maternal cousin of the complainant, used to visit their house, he said.
While searching for the child along with family members on Saturday, the father found his son's body stuffed in a sack, wrapped in a blanket and quilt, and partially buried in a water-filled pit near a maize field, he said.
Following an investigation, police detained Basudev (27), a resident of nearby Chalni Gorrapath village, he said.
During interrogation, the accused allegedly admitted to committing the crime and said he was dissatisfied with his earnings from daily wage work and wanted to make more money, the official said.
The accused regularly browsed social media for ways to earn quick money and subsequently developed the idea of extracting and selling organs of small children, the SSP said, citing his statement.
On November 5, the accused lured the child and took him to different places, bought liquor and chicken, and allegedly made the boy consume alcohol, he said.
After the child became intoxicated and fell asleep, the accused allegedly slit his throat with a knife. He cut open the child’s body and removed his kidneys, lungs and eyes, which he kept in a plastic bucket, Singh said.
The accused then wrapped the body in a blanket and quilt, stuffed it into a sack and dumped it in a water-filled pit in a field before covering it with soil, he said.
Based on his disclosure, police recovered the weapons allegedly used in the crime, a plastic bucket containing the removed body parts and other related materials from a pit in the area, he said, adding that further investigation was underway.
(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)