Three rapes in capital in 48 hours, three held

Jun 10: In a suspected case of honor killing in Telangana, a 20-year old woman was allegedly smothered to death by her parents for being in love with a man from another caste, becoming pregnant and refusing to undergo an abortion, police said on Tuesday.

The parents killed their daughter using a pillow while she was asleep in the early hours of June 7 in their house in Kalukuntla in Jogulamba-Gadwal district and sought to project it as natural death, claiming she died of a heart attack.

However, following specific information and suspicion raised by the village secretary over the death of the woman, a college student, a probe was launched and the couple arrested on charges of murder under Indian Penal Code section 302 after post-mortem, police said.

The parents decided to kill the woman, the youngest of their three daughters, a day after she was found pregnant and refused to undergo an abortion, police said.

The woman had fallen in love with the man while pursuing her degree course in Kurnool district in neighboring Andhra Pradesh and informed her parents about it after she was found pregnant during an examination by a doctor. Her parents feared that their daughter may elope with her lover and brought pressure on her to go for abortion.

Though initially, she agreed, later she declined, following which they killed her and told everyone that their daughter died of heart attack, the police official said. When a police team went to their house and insisted on a post-mortem after noticing some marks on her body indicating a struggle, the parents tried to stop it, saying there was no need.

Later, police shifted the body to a hospital where a post-mortem revealed the woman was "throttled to death". Her parents during interrogation confessed to killing their daughter, the official said, adding they were arrested.

Jan 17: Police have busted a "high- profile" sex racket operating in a three-star hotel in suburban Andheri and arrested a 29-year-old woman and rescued three female artists, including a minor, an official said on Thursday.

The Social Service (SS) branch of the city police conducted the raid at the hotel at Andheri East on Thursday, the official said.

"During the raid, three females, including a minor, were found to have been forced into prostitution. They were rescued and a woman, identified as Priya Sharma, who was operating the racket, was arrested," he said.

"Sharma was running tours and travel agency in Kandivali East. However, she was involved in immoral activities," senior inspector of SS branch, Sandesh Revale, said.

While one of the rescued is a woman actor and singer, who has worked in 'Savdhaan India' TV crime show, he said, another one has worked in a Marathi movie and serials.

The minor has worked in a web series, Revale added.

The offence was being registered against Sharma, he said.

Hyderabad, MAY 28: A three-year-old boy who accidentally fell into a newly drilled open borewell in Telangana's Medak district was found dead in the early hours of Thursday, police said.

The kid's body was retrieved at around 4 am after a nearly 10 hours' long rescue operation involving different agencies, they said.

"He died a while before we evacuated him, most likely due to the mud that covered him from the top sealing off necessary oxygen supply, " Medak District Superintendent of Police Chandana Deepti told PTI.

The boy had accidentally slipped into the 120- feet borewell at around 5 pm on Wednesday in an agricultural field located in Papannapet mandal of the district when he was walking with his grandfather and father, police earlier said.

As part of rescue efforts, a parallel trench was dug along the borewell hole with the help of earth excavating machines and oxygen was supplied into it, but the efforts went in vain as the boy's body was found stuck at a depth of around 25 feet, the police said.

Apart from the police, National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) personnel were also involved in the rescue operation.

The borewell into which the child fell was one among the three dug by the family since Tuesday night to try and find water for their fields. But none of them yielded any water, police had said.