Nabarangpur: Police have arrested a youth for allegedly killing the minor son of a priest in front of a temple in Odisha’s Nabarangpur district on Thursday.
According to sources, the incident took place in Mendara village under Dabugaon police limits in Nabarangpur district. The priest of Shiva temple atop Mendara hill in the village, Sanadhar Pujari, to perform morning rituals.
Some time after Sanadhar left home, his 5-year-old son Chandan wanted to go to him and started crying. As Chandan insisted, his maternal grandfather took him to the temple and left him there. Sanadhar told his son to play in front of the temple and got busy in performing the rituals.
Meanwhile, 23-year-old Jala Santa of the village arrived there and started harassing Chandan. As Chandan resisted him, Jala beat him up and smashed his head with a stone. On hearing the cries of Chandan, Sanadhar rushed there.
On finding his son in a pool of blood, the priest lost consciousness and fell down. But Jala continued his brutality and slashed a leg and a hand of Chandan with a sharp weapon.
Later, the villagers came to the temple and knew about the whole incident after getting Sandahar back to sense. They found Jala moving in the village and caught hold of him.
On being informed, a team from Debugaon police station went to the village and arrested Jala. They have registered a case and sent Chandan’s body for post-mortem.
