Malda, June 11: The body of a 13-year-old girl was found hanging from a tree in a mango orchard this morning.

Police suspect that the teenager, a resident of Harishchandrapur village, 100 km from here, was raped before she was hung from a branch of the tree.

Sheikh Moqtar had lodged a police complaint when his daughter did not return home from school on Saturday. A student of Class VI, she used to attend school under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan.

Moqtar’s family said the girl had often complained that some youths harassed her on the way to school. “But I didn’t give much importance then. I cannot imagine a little girl being raped and murdered like this,” a sobbing Moqtar said.

He has given the police the names of the youths.

Police officer Maqserur Rahman said the girl could have been raped. “We can say that for sure only after we get the autopsy report. The body has been sent to the district hospital for post-mortem. But someone hung it up from the tree to make it look like suicide.”

Rahman said the police were looking for the youths, all aged between 15 and 20.

Moqtar’s brother Alam Sheikh said the girl could not have gone to the spot, where her body was found, alone. “It is 8 km from our house. She must have been taken there forcefully on a bicycle or a motorcycle. The bruises on her knee show that she might have been tied with ropes. Besides, a boy had come to call on her the morning she was last seen.”

He alleged that the boy, too, has fled the village.