In a shocking incident from West Bengal’s Burdwan district, a father has been arrested for allegedly strangling his disabled son to death and burying the body near a lake. The horrific crime came to light when rising waters exposed the shallow grave, sparking outrage in the local community.
Police sources confirmed that Sonalal Mandi, a resident of Mandalgram under Memari police station, was taken into custody late Friday night. His victim was his own son, Surya, who was blind from birth and suffered from severe physical impairments that left his limbs largely non-functional.
The family’s struggles began early. Surya’s mother abandoned them shortly after his birth, leaving the child first with his grandmother and later his great-grandmother after the grandmother’s death. As the burden of caregiving mounted, neighbors say Mandi began viewing his son as an unbearable load.
Local reports indicate Mandi first tried to offload responsibility by attempting to place Surya in an orphanage, but when that failed, he resorted to murder. On Wednesday, he lured the boy to the banks of Kaladighi Lake in Barapalashan area of Memari. There, in a cold-blooded act, he choked the child and hastily buried the body nearby.
The next morning, heavy rains caused lake levels to rise, washing away the soil and revealing the corpse. Alerted by passersby, officers rushed to the scene, recovered the body, and sent it for postmortem at Burdwan Medical College. During intense interrogation, Mandi confessed to the killing, leading to his formal arrest.
Authorities have registered a murder case and are probing deeper into the circumstances. This tragedy underscores the desperate needs for better support systems for families caring for disabled children, as the community reels from the brutality of a father’s betrayal.