A 17-year-old girl was allegedly killed by her mother and two brothers, after they learnt that she had become pregnant outside of marriage in Telangana's Ranga Reddy district on Thursday.

The incident came to light on Friday, after police and local authorities dug up the body of the girl from a nearby field.

The Deccan Chronicle reported:

According to the police, Manjula was the only daughter of Soni and Devla Islavath...For the last one month, Manjula had reported sick and had been taking treatment at a nearby clinic. When she did not recover, her mother got suspicious and took her to a diagnostic centre on Thursday, where reports confirmed that Manjula was pregnant, the police said.

"After returning home, Soni and her sons questioned Manjula about the pregnancy. Despite asking several times, when she did not answer, Jagan (her brother) hit her on the head with a stick, due to which she fell down and died,” Amangallu inspector P Ravindra Prasad told DC.

The family then allegedly poured pesticide into her mouth to make it look like a suicide.

The New Indian Express reported that Manjula’s absence was noticed by villagers who questioned Soni about her whereabouts. Sensing something wrong, the village revenue officer alerted the police.

When confronted by the police, Soni first claimed Manjula had ended her life by consuming poison and that her body was buried in the fields. However, she later confessed to having killed her daughter herself.

An autopsy was later conducted on Manjula’s body, which was exhumed on Friday.