Patna,April 20 :ANGRY at his wife for not bearing a son four years after marriage, a temple priest pushed her into the Ganga from a bridge at Mokama in Bihar. Before that, he tossed their two- and- a- halfyear- old daughter into the river.The little girl died but her mother survived to tell the tale of her husband’s cruelty.
Toni Devi, 25, told the police at Hathidah police station in Patna district that her husband, Chandan Kumar Pathak, had thrown their only daughter Anjali from the Rajendra Bridge before shoving her into the Ganga on Wednesday night.
The locals found the girl’s body on the sandy banks of the river the next day. They also found Toni lying unconscious nearby.The woman said she did not die because, unlike her daughter, she had fallen into water.
Hathidah police station in- charge Om Prakash said an FIR had been lodged against Pathak. But “ the accused is absconding,” he said.“ We hope to apprehend him soon,” he added.
A police team raided Rohiyar, Pathak’s village where he was said to be working as a priest, on Monday.
“ The villagers told us Pathak had sold all his property in the village and did not stay at one place for more than a month. We have launched a manhunt to arrest him,” Om Prakash said.
Toni said she had married Pathak in 2006 and gave birth to Anjali a year later. “ After her birth, my husband got angry. He stayed away from her since then,” she said.
Toni said Pathak often grumbled that she had not given birth to a son who could earn and look after him in his old age.
She said she had been living at her parents’ place for quite some time until Pathak reached there on Wednesday to take her and Anjali to his village.“ We boarded a train at Jamui station to go to Mansi but he asked us to get down at Hathidah near Mokama,” she said.
After getting down at Hathidah, he took them to the Rajendra Bridge on the pretext of crossing over to Simaria on the other side of the river.“ While crossing the bridge, he kept mumbling about not having a son,” Toni said.
The mother said that around 11.30 pm, Pathak suddenly stopped and snatched Anjali from her, and threw her into the river.Shocked at her husband’s “ inhuman” behaviour, Toni stood stunned for a minute. Pathak then dragged her and pushed her into the river as well.The police recovered the body of the girl and have sent it for a postmortem.
Toni was admitted to a local hospital with minor injuries.Her mother was informed and came down to Hathidah to take back her daughter. But the ‘ killer’ priest remains at large.