BIRGUNJ, July 1: Police retrieved the half-burnt body of a 14-year-old girl from her funeral pyre at Chhapkaiya Tole in Parsa's Bahudarmai Municipality-7 on Wednesday night, suspecting ‘honor killing’ by her parents. 

According to preliminary investigations by the police, the girl was in love with a boy  from the same village and her parents were against the relationship, making it an issue of family honor. 

Police claim that this could be a case of honor killing. According to police, the girl's relatives called them at 11 PM on Wednesday, saying that the parents of the girl were trying to cremate her and that the incident looked suspicious. A police team reached the spot and retrieved the half-burnt body from the funeral pyre, said Prahlad Karki, Deputy Superintendent of Police, Parsa.  

According to him, after the police reached the cremation site, the girl's family and relatives ran away. After the situation looked suspicious, police arrested the dead girl’s mother Asha Devi,40, elder sister, 18, and aunt Urmila Devi, 50, for further investigation. 

According to Karki, the body was sent to Narayani Hospital in Birgunj for a postmortem and interrogation was underway. "We have received information that the body was being burnt secretly without informing the police," according to DSP Karki

While investigating the arrested family members of the deceased, police found out that the girl was in a love affair and her family thrashed her mercilessly after she was spotted meeting the boy near her house 3-4 days ago by her mother. According to police, the girl was then barred from coming out of the house. The girl then consumed poison (pesticide) which was available at their own shop. But instead of taking the girl to a hospital after knowing that she had consumed poison, her family kept her locked inside a room. 

The police have already filed a murder case against the family members of the girl at the Parsa District Court which has rermanded the arrested family members into custody for five days for further investigation. DSP Karki said that a search was going on for the  eight persons who were involved in the incident.

 
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