Three minor sisters jump to death from 9th floor of Ghaziabad high-rise

Ghaziabad (UP): Three sisters aged 12, 14 and 16 died in the early hours of Wednesday after falling from the ninth floor of their apartment in Ghaziabad’s Bharat City. Police are treating the case as a suicide and are examining whether their alleged addiction to a task-based Korean online “love game” played a role in the tragedy. The deaths of Nishika (16), Prachi (14), and Pakhi (12) around 2.15 am have left neighbours stunned and prompted a detailed investigation into their online activities and the events of that night.

Police said they received a call between 2.15 am and 2.18 am that three girls had fallen from a balcony at Bharat City Society in Sahibabad, under the Teelamod police station limits. The family lived in flat number 907 of B-1 Tower. Officers reached the spot within minutes and found the sisters lying on the ground about 80 feet below their apartment. They were rushed by ambulance to a government hospital in Loni, where doctors declared them dead on arrival.

According to the family, the three girls were sleeping in one room while their parents were in another. Their father, Chetan Kumar, told police that the girls asked for water, locked their room from inside and then jumped through the balcony window. He said the family heard a loud sound, broke open the locked door and ran downstairs, only to find the girls on the ground.

Inside the room, police recovered a diary containing an 18-page note. Investigators said the writing repeatedly referred to an online game and expressed regret toward the parents. One page carried the line, “Read everything written in this diary, it is all here…”, followed by a crying face emoji and the handwritten message, “Sorry papa, I am really sorry.” Another note reportedly said, “Sorry papa… I can’t leave the game.”

Deputy Commissioner of Police Nimish Patil said the investigation so far showed that the girls were heavily exposed to Korean digital content and spent considerable time on their phones. He added that their schooling had been irregular and their academic performance was below par. Patil said forensic analysis of the seized mobile phones, along with CCTV footage and digital records, was underway to understand their online interactions in the days leading up to the incident.

Assistant Commissioner of Police, Shalimar Garden, Atul Kumar Singh said the preliminary inquiry indicated that the sisters were involved in a task-based interactive Korean “love game”. He confirmed that their three mobile phones had been seized and sent for forensic examination. Singh said the family had been living in the rented flat for the past three years.

Additional Police Commissioner, Law and Order, Alok Priyadarshi said initial findings pointed toward suicide but investigators were still piecing together the exact sequence of events. He said the probe would look at the nature of the online game, any online contacts the girls may have had, and the contents of the recovered diary.

Uttar Pradesh Director General of Police Rajeev Krishna said the case was being examined in detail at the state level. He said the police department runs regular cyber awareness programmes and urged families to approach local police stations if they notice signs of harmful online activity or addiction among children.

The family’s circumstances have also drawn attention. Kumar, who works in online forex and share trading, had reportedly suffered financial losses of nearly Rs 2 crore, which affected household expenses, including electricity payments. Police said the girls had stopped attending school around two to three years ago. Kumar has two wives, both sisters, and there were five children in all – four daughters and a son. The entire family lived together.

Speaking to reporters with his face covered and voice trembling, Kumar said his daughters had been playing the Korean game for about two-and-a-half to three years, since the Covid-19 period. He said he did not know it involved tasks. “They often said they wanted to go to Korea. I did not know that this game involved such tasks. I came to know about all this only after the police forensic team examined their mobile phones,” he said. “If I had known that such tasks existed, I would have stopped it. No father would ever allow his children to be part of it.”

Family members and police said the three sisters were very close to each other. They ate, bathed and spent most of their time together, largely staying in their room. Kumar told officers that Prachi, the middle sister, once said she was the “boss” and that the younger sisters followed her directions.

A neighbour named Arun, who lives on the 10th floor of a facing tower, described what he saw around 2 am. He said he noticed the oldest girl sitting on the window ledge of the ninth-floor balcony, rocking slightly. “As I watched, it appeared that the second sister was hugging the older sister, and they were rocking together. Suddenly, the older sister toppled backwards and fell through the window, and the second sister came with her. The youngest sister, who too was at the window, appeared to lunge forward to catch them, but she too fell through the opening,” he said. Police said they were examining his statement to rule out any foul play or coercion.

Officials said the so-called Korean “love game” was not a single identifiable application but a pattern of online interaction spreading through social media and messaging platforms. In such cases, unknown individuals pose as foreign users, build emotional attachment and gradually assign escalating tasks that can create mental stress and isolation among young players.

Forensic psychologist Deepti Puranik said many adolescents today identify more with their gaming avatars than with their real-world selves. “Instead of the real identity, a lot of adolescents these days identify themselves more with their gamer identity or the avatar that they take on. Their entire psyche is moving around their competency in that game rather than in real life,” she said. The case has drawn comparisons to the Blue Whale challenge, a 50-day task-based game that surfaced in 2017 and was believed to have led to more than 130 deaths across Russia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Each day reportedly involved a new task, some of which were dangerous.

Police said post-mortem examinations were underway and that forensic analysis of the seized phones would be crucial in determining the nature of the game, the girls’ online contacts and the pressures they may have faced. The investigation continues.