Banka, Aug. 13: Satish Roy (53) and Paroli Devi (46) were shocked to see a police jeep stopping in front of their hut at Lilagoda village, barely 10km from the district headquarters of Banka.

The couple did not have the faintest idea that the police had come to their doorstep on August 11 with the news of their son’s death in Jaipur, Rajasthan, and a summon to conduct his last rites there.

A daily wage labourer and father of three sons and two daughters, Satish said he had no money to go all the way to Jaipur for the cremation of Rohit Kumar (16) and gave consent to the Banka police to cremate him.

Arun Kumar Roy, the station house office of Banka police station, said Rohit had left Lilagoda a month ago and went to Jaipur in search of work.

Sources in the Banka police said Government Railway Police personnel caught Rohit travelling in a train without a ticket at Jaipur station. The railway magistrate forwarded him to a juvenile home, where he died on August 8 reportedly of prolonged renal ailment.

The police in Jaipur got in touch with their counterparts in Banka and the latter asked Rohit’s parents to go to the Rajasthan capital for his cremation. The sources added that Rohit was suffering from kidney ailment but his family could not afford his treatment. “We could not afford to go to Jaipur for our son’s cremation. We did not get an opportunity to see him for the last time,” said Paroli. “We don’t know if we would be able to afford his sraadh ,” she said. Satish and Paroli were in Ban-ka today to arrange funds for their son’s memorial service.

A source in the Lilagoda police station said: “We acted as a bridge between Jaipur police and the couple. We tried to help them but they did not agree.”

Sources in the office of district magistrate Dipak Anand said the couple had turned down the help offered by the security personnel.