Karnataka man kills infant daughter on advice of astrologer as he wanted boy

Bengaluru: In a shocking incident, a father strangulated his one-and-a-half-month-old infant allegedly because she was a girl.

The accused identified as 27-year-old man Manjunath, a daily wage worker, strangled his daughter, Niharika, on Tuesday, as he was upset on fathering a girl child and wished to have a son.

Manjunath's younger siblings also had a girl child which irked him further due to which he was constantly in an argument with his wife named Supreetha.

Supreetha who along with her accused husband stay in Karnataka's Chikmagalur gave birth to a girl in the month of May.

On Tuesday, when no one was in house and his wife was busy with household work, Manjunath took this as an opportunity to strangled his baby with his bare hands and went back to sleep, pretending the incident never happened.  

After completing her chores, when Supreetha came into house, she found blood coming out of newborn Niharika's nose and she had stopped breathing.

Following, she woke her husband Manjunath, who told her that he was not aware of the matter as he was not feeling well and sleeping.

On finding the infant dead, the family approached a doctor who declared the baby died from asphyxiation and suggested filing a police complaint.

The family and wife lodged a police complaint against Manjunath. However, before the police could catch the accused, he managed to escape and buried the infant girl’s dead body.

After being arrested by the police, Manjunath confessed that he had committed the crime on the advice of an astrologer who had asked him to sacrifice the girl child to bring good fortune.

Police have exhumed the girl's body and have started a further investigation into the matter.

The police have booked Manjunath under the charges of murder and arrested him to produce him before a court for trial.