A 13-year-old girl died on Monday, hours after she was found with severe burn injuries in a village field in Odisha’s Bargarh district, police said.
Bargarh in-charge SP Abilash said the family members of the victim filed a statement that she had set herself on fire. The police subsequently registered a case of unnatural death.
“We are investigating the matter. We have also seized the video which she recorded before taking the extreme step. Police are investigating the matter from multiple angles,” said Abilash.
Police sources said that at around 8 am on Monday, villagers found her in half-charred and unconscious condition on the village football field and rushed her to the nearby hospital.
She was a class 8 student of a state-run residential school and had gone to a relative’s home a fortnight ago as she was not well. Her father works as a labourer in Chennai, and her mother and other siblings stay at the relative’s house.
The Gaisilet police reached the spot and launched a probe into the matter from multiple angles, an officer said. A special team comprising three inspectors has been formed to carry out the probe.
Sambalpur IG Himansu Lal said the police will investigate the matter properly and take action as per law.
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In the past one month, three other girls from different parts of the state lost their lives due to burn injuries. A 20-year-old student of a leading government college in Balasore set herself ablaze on campus on July 12 over alleged inaction by authorities over her complaint of sexual harassment by a professor. She died at AIIMS, Bhubaneswar two days later.
On July 19, a minor girl was allegedly set on fire by unidentified miscreants in Puri district and died at AIIMS, Delhi on August 2. The third such incident took place in Kendrapada on August 6, when a 21-year-old college student’s charred body was found from her house.
