Hyderabad: The body of a six-month-old premature baby girl went missing from her grave at Punjagutta graveyard, just a day after she was buried on Aug 9. Her family discovered this when they returned the next day to bury her twin sister, who had also died at the hospital due to health complications. Unable to find the infant’s remains, the family cremated the twin and filed a police complaint.Banjara Hills police registered a case and took four graveyard caretakers into custody for questioning.According to cops, a 35-year-old employee at a silver ornament-making unit in Ghansi bazaar, approached them on Aug 10 alleging that the body of his prematurely born girl had gone missing from the graveyard, within 24 hours of them burying her.“He said that his wife had given birth to twins on Friday at a private hospital in Banjara Hills. The babies were born at six months and admitted to NICU. While undergoing treatment, one girl died around 3 am on Sunday (Aug 9) and was buried at the Punjagutta graveyard in the afternoon,” said Banjara Hills inspector, Suhasan. According to him, the family paid Rs 2,500 to the graveyard staff for the burial.Unfortunately, the twin also died due to health complications on Monday morning (Aug 10). When the family returned to the graveyard to bury her, they noticed that the spot where the first infant was buried had been dug up, police said.“Since the body was not in the grave, they confronted the graveyard workers who told them they have no clue about what happened,” the inspector added.Distraught, family later cremated the second baby and lodged a police complaint against the graveyard caretakers. “The family suspects that the body had been removed from the burial place by unknown persons and requested appropriate legal action,” the inspector said.Based on their complaint, a case was registered under Section 301 (trespass on burial places, etc) of the BNS. Police said that four workers — Jagan, Prasas, Mallesh and Joseph — have been taken into custody for questioning.“The CCTV cameras at the graveyard haven’t been working since July 27 due to a technical problem. However, we are interrogating the accused and verifying all possible angles,” said a senior police officer, adding, “The main suspicion is that a stray animal might have dug out the body from the grave. A small body part was found in the bushes near by which we will send to FSL for analysis and DNA test.”
