‘Hatred for beautiful girls’: Inside the shocking case of a woman who killed several children

Panipat, Haryana: The wedding celebrations in Naultha village had barely ended when the atmosphere turned from joy to terror.

A six-year-old girl, Vidhi, had gone missing. Hours later, her family found her lifeless body inside a dimly lit storeroom — face down in a plastic tub filled with water, head submerged, tiny feet left hanging outside.

What initially appeared to be a tragic accident soon spiralled into one of Haryana’s most horrifying crime stories in recent memory.

By Wednesday, Panipat Police announced the arrest of 32-year-old Poonam, the child’s aunt. But what investigators unearthed next stunned even seasoned officers: Vidhi was not the first child Poonam had killed, she was the fourth.

A pattern hidden in plain sight

Panipat Superintendent of Police Bhupender Singh, who briefed the media on the chilling revelations, said the woman had confessed to killing three girls over the last two years, and shockingly, her own three-year-old son. Her victims, aged six, six and nine, were all related to her.

“She killed two children, including her son, in Bhawar in 2023, and a girl in Sewah in August this year,” SP Singh said.

Before Vidhi’s death exposed her, families had unknowingly buried their children, believing the deaths to be freak mishaps, a slip into a tank, a fall into water. No one suspected foul play.

Police now believe Poonam followed a consistent modus operandi: luring the children to an isolated spot and drowning them in tubs or household water tanks.

“Jo sundar bachhiye hain unse inko nafrat si hai”

When investigators pressed her on the motive, the answers only deepened the horror.

The SP quoted her as saying that “jo sundar bachhiye hain unse inko nafrat si hai (She harboured hate for beautiful girls).”

“Usko chidd machti hai kahi bade hokar issay sundar na ban jaye,” she allegedly told police, expressing jealousy at the idea that the children might grow up to be more beautiful than her.

According to officers, the crimes began after her marriage in 2019. “After her marriage, she indulged in such things. She appears to be a psycho type. She is not very educated,” Singh said.

A mother who killed to escape suspicion

Perhaps the most disturbing twist came when police learned that Poonam had murdered her own son, three-year-old Shubham, in order to evade suspicion.

“She killed her sister-in-law’s nine-year-old daughter… Fearing that her family might suspect her, she had killed her own 3-year-old son, Shubham, too,” police said.

The pressure of the earlier murder pushed her to commit what investigators describe as a calculated act: eliminating the only potential link to her crime.

As rumours spread across villages linking the killings to ritualistic practices, police clarified that no such motive existed.

SP Singh categorically said they had “ruled out any child sacrifice angle.”

Instead, investigators believe Poonam’s acts stemmed from deep psychological issues, possibly involving pathological jealousy, fixation and rage. Officers describe her as detached and disturbingly calm during questioning.

Cracks appear after Vidhi’s murder

The case began to unravel on Monday night when Vidhi disappeared after guests left the wedding venue. Police allege Poonam lured the girl upstairs, drowned her in a tub, and then bolted the door from outside before returning to the gathering, acting normal.

This time, however, inconsistencies and circumstances triggered suspicion.

A police team combed through the house, questioned relatives and examined CCTV footage from the locality. Within two days, the story that had gone unquestioned for years collapsed.

As police informed other districts, past cases once written off as household accidents suddenly stood exposed as deliberate murders.