Among the 11 who were killed in Delhi's Burari on Sunday, the eldest member Narayan Devi committed suicide with the help of a belt, CNN-News 18 reported. Police officers have not found the belt yet.
Delhi Burari deaths latest updates: Among the 11 members of a family who were found dead in Delhi's Burari area on Sunday, an autopsy found that the eldest, 77-year-old Narayan Devi, had committed suicide with the help of a belt, CNN-News 18 reported. Police officers have not found the belt yet.
Narayan Devi's daughter Sujata refuted claims of occult practices, as the police suspected after finding a diary that suggested otherwise. She told Firstpost that the family was happy and was looking forward to the granddaughter's marriage, and had no reason to commit suicide.
The 77-year-old was the last one to die, according to the autopsy reports. Some of the notes found in the Bhatia family's house said that "one will not die" but attain something "great", the officer said. Adding more confusion to the case, postmortem examinations found liquid chemical substances in the stomachs of five of the deceased, reported CNN-News18.
Investigators are scrutinising the call data records of the family members and their internet search history, as well. The police said they will also interrogate the family of the man who was engaged to marry the granddaughter.
A Delhi Police officer said they recovered handwritten notes from the house which talked about how a person can overcome fear by covering eyes and mouth, how a person can attain salvation, and how the human body is temporary but the soul continues to live on.
"The notes talk about if a group of 11 people follows these rituals, all problems would ease out and they would attain salvation. Some notes have dates on which they were written while others don't. All the notes talk about reaching the end and gaining peace," one of the investigators said.
A report by the sub-divisonal magistrate to the crime branch says that the entire family had books on 'occult rituals' and religious practices, and which they performed as well.
Eleven members of a family, including two minor boys, were found dead under mysterious circumstances at their home in north Delhi's Burari on Sunday, with the police suspecting the family followed some religious practice to "attain salvation". Postmortem examination report of six bodies showed that the cause of death was hanging. No signs of struggle were found.
People living in the lane in north Delhi's Burari are in a state of shock.
Every day, people crossing the Bhatia residence would read a Hindi verse the family had written on a board put up outside the grocery store owned by it but on Sunday, all they could see was reporters, TV cameras and policemen moving in and out of the residence.
There were discussions about whether the deceased were killed or had committed suicide as one boarded a "Gramin Seva" autorickshaw from the GTB Nagar metro station, which is six kilometres away from Sant Nagar in Burari, from where the incident was reported.
Police personnel guard near the house, where 11 members of a family in Burari area of New Delhi on Sunday. PTI
The passengers in the autorickshaw could be heard discussing the massive traffic jam in the morning hours since Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal paid a visit to the "house of horror".
"We got to know about the incident through news channels around 8 am. Everybody is talking about it. There are also stories floating that the family did it due to some religious belief," a woman passenger said.
Neighbours said they were scared after hearing about the incident.
"If they were killed, we are worried about the law-and-order situation in Burari. Last month, there was a shootout in broad daylight in which a commoner was also killed and on the first day of this month, 11 bodies are found in a house," a resident of the locality said.
Others were worried about whether anyone would even think about buying the house where the bodies were found and after the police finding handwritten notes indicating a "religious" angle to the deaths.
Even as the police were looking for clues in the house, it was chaos outside as locals had turned up in large numbers, seeing the media frenzy.
While the bodies were being taken away, some were seen making videos on their phones. A neighbour, who did not wish to be named, said his elderly mother had fallen sick after hearing about the incident.
Another neighbour said there was a feeling of fear in the locality.
"My tenants were so scared that they told me they were going to stay at a relative's place for a week," he added.
The police found some handwritten notes in the house, which, they said suggested that the family might have been into some sort of religious practices.
The deceased were identified as Narayan Devi (77), her daughter Pratibha (57), two sons Bhavnesh (50) and Lalit Bhatia (45).
Bhavnesh's wife Savita (48) and their three children — Meenu (23) and Nidhi (25) and Dhruv (15) — were also found dead, along with Lalit's wife Tina (42) and their 15-year-old son Shivam.
Pratibha's daughter Priyanka (33), who got engaged last month and was supposed to get married in November, was also found dead.
With inputs from PTI
