Seven-year-old missing boy found dead inside cooler

 A seven-year-old boy, who was reportedly abducted two days ago, was found dead inside a desert cooler installed in a temple in northeast Delhi’s Gokulpuri area on Monday, police said.

Body of Sahil Khan was discovered around 9 am on Monday after the local children came to take sweets at the temple as part of the ongoing Janmashtami celebrations and complained of a nauseating stench emanating from inside the temple.

After noticing a body inside a desert cooler, the priests informed the police. “A decomposed body was recovered from a cooler installed in the premises. A rope was tied around his neck and blood stains were seen around his mouth,” said a senior police officer adding that the body has been sent for post-mortem.

“There were ligature marks around the neck that suggest that the child was throttled to death. The child had his clothes on in a proper manner. We are not ruling out the possibility of a sexual assault and things would be clear only after the post-mortem report,” said the officer.

A case of murder has been registered at Gokulpuri police station and police are investigating the matter to nab the accused.

The police checked the record to ascertain the body’s identity and found that seven-year-old Sahil Khan had been missing from the same area for the past two days and a police complaint was filed by the mother.

“We called up Sana Khan who reported about her missing son. She identified the body is that of her son,” said the officer.

On August 31, Sahil was believed to be playing outside his house in Gokulpuri in the afternoon when his mother failed to locate him.