'She was active, jubilant, helped out at temple & crematorium'

New Delhi: Neighbours and relatives describe 9-year-old Nisha (name changed) as an active, jubilant and carefree girl who always used to roam around in her small cycle around the locality without any worries or concerns. "She couldn't stay at one place...she always used to happily greet us every morning with mata ji namaste...who would have thought this would happen to her?" asked Poonam, one of her neighbours.

As per them, Nisha used to go every morning to the nearby temple, called Jay Peer Baba, around 100 metres from her house, with her mother, and used to run all types of errands and carry out other chores there. "She used to play around here every day and following which towards the night she used to go to the crematorium nearby to help out the four accused there in the form of assisting them with logs for cremation, making tea for them, cleaning the space and other things," said Chandni, caretaker of the temple.

Nisha used to run around in her cycle all the time and even used to clean the temple premises when told to do so, she added. "Her mother was a ragpicker and used to sit and beg for money outside the temple everyday...since she knew all the four accused, she never doubted their intentions and let her daughter go and help them out," Chandni further said.

The landlord of the house where Nisha and her parents had recently shifted, remembered the girl as someone who was agile and never used to sit in one place. "She was a girl who was upfront and confident in her behaviour, you can ask anyone…," he told Millennium Post.

Sitting outside their Old Nangli house, Nisha's father said that while they never had any intentions to make their daughter study, she recently did develop aspirations to get educated.

"The lockdown happened and then we didn't get her admitted to any school...but she did tell us that she wanted to study," the father said.

"Now she was gaining sense and maturity with age and hence wanted to study...but her mother always worried that if she got educated, she will get involved among bad elements which will have a negative impact on her and she will be manhandled...now see what has happened without her even studying," Poonam said, while Komal, another neighbour, nodded in agreement.

Even in the several bylanes inside the village, chatter is abound about what had allegedly happened to the "village's daughter". "I saw her grow up at this temple...she was also very helpful with the accused, assisting them in all their chores and serving them tea, who would have thought Radhe Shyam (main accused), who had a clean image, would turn out to be like this...she had only gone out to fetch cold water," Chandni lamented, adding that the issue was now being unnecessarily politicised and it was a matter of time when the matter would die down like every other case.