On Sunday, the police along with members of the District Child Protection Services and the media were all in the backyard of a house in Ithamozhi in Kanyakumari district.
They waited anxiously as two men unearthed and slowly removed the corpses of two 10 day old girls. An officer at the site said the bodies were a devastating thing to witness.
After the bodies were recovered, S. Kumutha, the District Child Protection Officer spoke to the media and after reciting the incident, her first question was, “But do you know who failed to show the slightest signs of sadness or even shock?” She followed it with, “The parents of the dead twin girls who were right next to us.”
On June 2nd, S. Kumutha received a disturbing call from an anonymous informant that a pair of twin girls had died under mysterious circumstances at the district. The informant informed Kumutha that the babies were only 10 days old.
Kumutha said, “I immediately dispatched my social workers to the residence where the children had been buried.”
39 year old Kannan and 29 year old Divya had twin girls on May 22nd at a local hospital. The babies died in Kannankulam at Divya’s house.
Kumutha told the media skeptically, “When we interrogated Divya, she said that she had breastfed both the children at around 4:30 A.M., in the morning. After that, she put them to sleep. But when she woke up, both the children were dead, she claims. She is saying they suffocated to death.”
The social workers immediately informed the Kottar Police Station and the relatives of the babies have been brought in for questioning.
An investigating officer informed, “The couple had been married for five years and they already have a two year old daughter. We are questioning the entire family because the children were in good health when they died. A case has been registered under Section 174 of the CrPC (unnatural death.) Nothing suspicious has however been discovered in the postmortem so far.”
S. Kumutha has revealed that the doctor conducted the postmortem revealed that the death was unnatural. “The doctor has advised us to investigate the matter well. In Kannan’s house, all his five brothers have girl children and it is possible that they pressurised (sic) the couple into killing their own children,” she claimed.
The Child Protection Officer is doubtful of the parents story as it seems very unlikely that both the girls suffocated and died. Kumutha explained, “When we questioned neighbours about this, they told us that there was no sign of death or sorrow in the house. Nobody was crying and the children were not even rushed to the hospital.”
