He had not yet reached boyhood; he had not even stepped into his first lessons at a school. Just at the age of three, his life was cruelly snatched away, allegedly by his own mother.
The last rites of the three-year-old boy from Aluva who succumbed to the injuries inflicted allegedly by his mother, was held on Saturday. The funeral function was held around 12.30 pm at Palakkamukal Juma Masjid in Kalamassery.
Before the body of the child was taken to the Juma Masjid, the parents were allowed to see his mortal remains. Hena, a Jharkhand native and 28-year-old mother, along with the boy’s father who is a West Bengal native, was brought to the Kalamassery medical college where the child’s post mortem was done.
The police had initially planned to conduct the funeral after the relatives of the child were found. “Though two police teams had gone to Jharkhand and West Bengal to find the relatives of the parents to enquire more about the parents and to inform the relatives about the death, the teams were unsuccessful. So we conducted the funeral taking into consideration his parents are here,” an official at Eloor police told TNM.
Hena, mother of the deceased child, was arrested by police on Thursday. An FIR was filed under section 302 (punishment for murder) after the child passed away on Friday. She was booked earlier under Indian Penal Code section 307 (attempt to murder), section 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt), section 326 (voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapons or means) and section 75 of Juvenile Justice Act (punishment for cruelty to Child).
The father has also been arrested and booked under IPC section 202 (intentional omission to give information of offence by person bound to inform) and section 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence, or giving false information to screen offender).
The child had succumbed to the severe head injuries on Friday morning in Rajagiri hospital. According to police, his mother Hena, had beaten him on the head with a rolling board used to make chapatis. But when he was brought to the hospital on Thursday evening by his father, doctors were told that the child fell from a staircase. But the hospital administration informed the police after they found burn marks on the body of the child.
Though a surgery was conducted, the internal bleeding in the three-year-old’s head could not be contained.