A day after a man from Andhra Pradesh approached the Surat police claiming that the minor girl, whose body was found in the city on April 6, might be his missing daughter, the police sent a sample of the man for a DNA match.
“We are exploring the Andhra Pradesh angle and trying to find out exactly how the girl went missing, which circumstances it occurred, who brought her to Surat and other details. If the man who claims to be the father of the girl is proved after the DNA test, then the whole angle of investigation would take a different turn, as police will have to try and trace the details of the girl from October 17 to April,” city police commissioner Satish Sharma told ToI.
Speaking to reporters during a press conference earlier this week, Sharma had said: "The man said that his daughter had gone missing in October last year. The man said his claim was based on the fact that the photo of his missing daughter matched with that of the victim. He also furnished the Aadhaar card of his missing daughter. We are not yet certain that the victim is his daughter. Therefore, we will match their DNA samples to verify the claim.”
The minor is believed to have been kidnapped, tortured and raped before being dumped near a cricket ground in Bhestan area of Surat on April 6. Her autopsy revealed that the girl was raped and tortured for at least eight days.
Earlier in the week, Minister of State for Home Pradeepsinh Jadeja said that the Gujarat Police scanned the data of as many as 8,000 missing girls to identify the deceased.
"She was strangled to death and the post-mortem indicated that the girl was tortured and raped for at least eight days," Jadeja told reporters in Gandhinagar.
He then said that the Surat Crime Branch was leaving no stone unturned to establish her identity. "The police have scanned details of 8,000 missing girls and it seems she is from outside the state and was dumped here after committing the crime," he said.
Commissioner Satish Sharma earlier said there was no sign of a struggle at the spot where her body was recovered which indicated the crime was committed elsewhere.
Surat Civil Hospital's Forensic Sciences Laboratory head Ganesh Govekar said: "The girl's body had 86 injury marks including some on her private parts."
Police Inspector BK Jhala said the police registered a case of rape and also booked the unidentified accused under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act.