The black magic ritual sacrifice of a seven-year-old boy has sparked fury in India after it was revealed the boy was killed to bring good luck to a school.
The victim was found dead in his bed on Sunday night at the hostel where he lived in the city of Hathras, not far from the country’s famous Taj Mahal.
Police said on Friday that the school’s owner, Jasodhan Singh, his son, Dinesh Baghel, who was the school’s principal, and three teachers were arrested in the case.
Instead of alerting authorities, police said Baghel hid the body in the trunk of his car.
Police officer Himanshu Mathur revealed that the boy was murdered before a black magic ceremony conducted by Baghel’s father.
A seven-year-old boy from India was killed in a ritual sacrifice to bring good fortune to a school
Police said five people, including a teacher and his father, were arrested in northern India for the murder.
“The boy was to be brought to an altar as part of a ritual, but he was killed before the ceremony could be completed,” he said.
Baghel and his father were arrested along with three other teachers from the school, Mathur added.
Mathur gave no further details about how the boy had died and local media reports said the body was undergoing a post-mortem examination.
India’s National Crime Records Bureau filed 103 cases of human sacrifice in the country between 2014 and 2021.
Ritual killings are often carried out to appease deities and are most common in tribal and remote areas, where belief in witchcraft and the occult is widespread.
Last year, police arrested five men over the 2019 murder of a 64-year-old woman who was killed and beheaded with a machete after visiting a temple in remote northeast India.
Police said the alleged ringleader had been performing a religious rite to mark the anniversary of his brother’s death.