The arrested boys at Patna Sahib Government Railway Police station. Picture by Sachin

Patna, April 25: Three teenaged youths, including a minor, have been arrested on charges of sexually assaulting and then killing a 10-year-old girl, who went missing from Patna Sahib railway station on April 20.

The arrests come four days after the body of the girl was recovered from an onion field, 2km from Patna Sahib railway station.

According to the police, the three accused, all rickshaw pullers, confessed to having sexually assaulted the child before strangulating her to death.

The boys, aged between 16 and 18 years, said they picked up the girl from the Patna Sahib Railway Station on April 20, the police said.

The three are residents of Bhatti and Dhawanpura area of Patna City.

Superintendent of police (SP) railways Suresh Chaudhary told The Telegraph the boys were roaming around the railway station on April 20 afternoon when they spotted the girl with her brother in her lap.

“The girl’s mother saw the boy who first approached her children. The police made a sketch based on the description given by her. The mother had claimed the boy was playing some songs on his mobile phone to attract one-and-a-half-year-old brother of the girl. The baby got interested, he took the phone and held it against his ears,” the officer said.

With the girl also showing interest in the songs, the boy then gave his phone to her.

“Being a child, even she wished to listen to the music and requested the boy for the same. By that time it was 7pm and the Rajgir-Danapur passenger train had entered the platform. The rush and noise increased on the platform. The boys took advantage of the crowd and made the girl get into the train,” the SP said.

Chaudhary said one of the boys said they got out of the train as it reached Didarganj Halt.

The train reached Didarganj in just 10 minutes. They got out of the train and walked with the girl and her brother to Karmali Chak. The brother was in the lap of the girl and hence they had to take him along. There, two others snatched the brother from her arms and put him in one corner. They slapped the girl many times and attempted to rape her. They thought the girl would die, but she did not. After that they strangulated her to death and then fled, police source said.

The boys admitted that they were good friends, the source added.

The police said investigations were under way to find out if more boys were involved in the crime.

Chaudhary told The Telegraph the post-mortem report of the girl showed an attempt to rape. “The report does not mention rape but an attempt for the same. Semen was found on the clothes of the victim which the police recovered at the site of crime. The police will send them to the forensic science laboratory. The police are treating the case as an attempt to rape and murder.”

He said one of the arrested was a juvenile, while the other two looked like adults.

“Their exact ages will be determined. One of them is around 16 years old while the other two look to be adults. The police are presently determining the age of the three. They will be sent to the remand home or jail accordingly,” he said.

Meanwhile, the one-and-a-half-year-old brother of the girl is safe and has been handed to his mother, the police said.

“The three teenagers left the brother at the same spot where they had attacked the girl. The boy kept crying near the body of his sister for the whole night on April 20 before the police recovered him the next day.

He has been handed over to his mother and is safe,” SP Chaudhary added.

The police were able to locate the accused based on the sketch they had drawn and released yesterday. The mother of the children had seen the man before she went to the washroom at the station. When she returned, she found the children missing.

The family resides in Khagaria district. The mother and children had come to the Patna Sahib railway station with two other women on Wednesday morning to buy cosmetics.

“We are poor people. We buy cosmetics from Patna City and then travel to different villages to sell them. We came here in the morning and went around the market for business. We returned to the station by 4pm as we had to catch the train to Khagaria,” the grieving mother had told The Telegraph.