Youth Found Hanging In Cuttack; MOMO Challenge Suspected

Cuttack: A youth was found hanging from the ceiling of an under-construction club house at Umara Gaon village in Mahanga area of Cuttack district on Wednesday.

The deceased has been identified as Umakant Behera.

On receiving informed about Behera’s death, his family members rushed to the spot and later found the deadly MOMO Application downloaded on his mobile phone.

They lodged a complaint at Mahanga police station alleging that their son took the extreme step after playing the MOMO Challenge game.

According to sources, Umakant had been staying in Chennai and returned home just two months back.

Two days ago, Twin City Police Commissioner Satyajit Mohanty had informed that the Commissionerate Police has decided to launch a drive called ‘Know Your Police’ from this week to aware school students about the dangers of playing the MOMO Challenge game.

In the first phase, students will be invited to different police stations to spend 45 minutes to an hour to know about the threats associated with the online game, the Commissioner had said.

On September, the Odisha Crime Branch had issued a list of advisory for the parents, teachers as well as media asking them to be aware of this threat and save the children from the same by taking certain precautionary measures.

MOMO Challenge is being circulated by some mischievous and criminal-minded people on social media. It instigates people, especially children to commit suicide as the final task. As some innocent people around the world have fallen prey to this malicious game, there is a need for the parents and teachers to be aware of this threat and save the children from it, the advisory stated.

An unknown number having the profile of a girl’s distorted face with protruding eyes and a wide mouth appears with a WhatsApp invitation from an unknown number. The perpetrators of this horrific crime monitor the status and profiles of people on social networking websites to target people with suicidal tendencies.