The room where the triple murder took place in Dhanbad on Tuesday. Picture by Gautam Dey

Dhanbad, Dec. 7: Three sisters were burnt to death last night by their brother-in-law who despite being married, wanted to wed to one of them and when thwarted, vent his ire by burning down the room the women were sleeping in.

The incident took place in the home of Shiv Shankar Prasad, the caretaker of the public health engineering department’s guesthouse in the city.

Yesterday, Prasad was in the house with his daughters Usha (30), Rima (26) and Rina (23). Usha’s nine-year-old son Sahil and Rima’s seven-year-old daughter Misty were also there. Prasad’s son Arup works in Durgapur, daughter Rekha is married and lives in Calcutta, while fifth daughter Nisha is married to Sonu Kumar and lives in Chandigarh.

Nisha, who got married in 2006, became pregnant two years ago. Prasad’s youngest daughter Rina was sent to look after her in Chandigarh at that time, and it was there that Sonu fell in love with her.

Ever since, Sonu pestered his father-in-law to let him marry Rina, but every time he was thwarted by Usha and Rima, who vehemently opposed the relationship.

Sensing that matters were getting out of hand, Prasad fixed Rina’s marriage elsewhere and date was set as February 7 next year. A devastated Sonu opposed the match and pleaded with Prasad to allow him to marry Rina instead.

When his pleas fell on deaf ears, Sonu came to Dhanbad yesterday, without telling his wife where he was going. In a bid to change the minds of Rina’s elder sisters, he went to Prasad’s house last evening, which the two children present witnessed.

Later, Prasad went to bed at 10pm with his grandchildren, while his daughters slept in another room. The fire in the room in which the three women slept was noticed around 5am by a neighbour.

The neighbours found the room locked from outside, the keys lying on the verandah and a kerosene container lying at the spot. They broke open the door only to find the charred bodies. The women had been tied to the bed.

Later, the police found an used ticket of Kalka Mail along with Sonu’s clothes and identity card. However, he could not be traced.

DSP (law and order) Sajay Ranjan said prima facie it appeared that Sonu was involved in the killing.