TOI

Nagpur, Aug 2: The priest, in his early forties, was known to be a pious man. But only until he was arrested by the city police for murdering his four-day-old granddaughter. Piety gave way to cruelty when he connived with his wife to throw the little one into the swirling waters of Nag river near Baidyanath Chowk on Wednesday evening.

Ganeshpeth police have arrested grandparents Mahesh Vajpayee, 42, and his wife Seema, both residents of Wardha, for killing the baby whose body was traced near Mehendi Lawns area, three kilometres away from the spot. Initially, the police said, the grandparents claimed that they thought that the baby had died before throwing it into the river while the mother waited somewhere else. A police team has been sent to Wardha to trace the mother of the baby.

Police said that the baby was delivered by the 22-year-old unwed daughter of the Vajpayees at a hospital in Sadar on July 27. An offspring of illicit relations the girl had, the grandparents initially wanted to donate the baby to an orphanage in Mohan Nagar. But their request was turned down and were instead asked to take it over to Amravati.

Police said that the accused were held due to alert citizens who spotted the couple while they were about to hurl the baby. It was learnt that eye-witness Ravindra Shende, a cart-puller and hawker, was attracted by the cries of the baby who was being cajoled by a middle-aged woman.

Before Shende could think of what was happening, he heard a loud splash. Realising the baby had been thrown into the water, Shende raised an alarm and some others rushed to the spot. As people started gathering, a mobike-borne commando, attached to Ganeshpeth police station, stopped to ascertain facts and also alerted the control room about the incident.