The Karma Killings

1

- Since the day she vanished,

I searched everywhere

until I was exhausted.

I never ignored any leads.

I heard in the news about

where kids had disappeared,

and I went there.

Someone would say beggars

had kidnapped them

or something else.

Whenever I got

any information, I went there.

Every 15 to 20 days,

a child would vanish.

The significant thing is

this happened

at one specific location.

Rumors were that the children

Went to the water tower and disappeared.

No one knew

what happened to them.

All of these children

were from

lower-class families.

One's father

was a rickshaw driver.

Another was a peddler.

These children

would go out to play

and suddenly disappear.

- I wondered,

"What happened? Where is she?"

Such nasty thoughts.

Horrible ideas in my head

about the possibilities.

She is a girl,

so how can a father

imagine anything good?

When we were kids,

she told me,

"Ask for some money

from Dad,

so we can

eat something nice."

She would save her

half for Dad, while I

would eat the rest.

Mom said,

"You both are so different.

She shares her food,

but you eat yours all up."

Mom told her to take

the clothes to the tailor.

Jyoti said, "I will go."

She bought a banana

and asked Mom

to give me half of it.

She gave me

half of the banana

before leaving.

After that, I never saw her.

Dad searched for her.

We waited on the street,

hoping she would turn up.

At the house where she went,

Mom even asked him

if he had seen her.

She was right there

in his house. She

was still alive.

These children

had been disappearing

since January 2005.

That was when the first case

was reported.

Some minor investigations

were done.

But they were not taken

too seriously.

If you look

at the demographics,

Sector 31 is a posh area,

but it's adjacent

to Nithari.

Nithari has a lot of

small huts

occupied by

low-wage laborers.

While I was posted there,

Vinod Pandey was the chief

investigative officer

on this case.

When 20 to 25 cases

had piled up,

we noticed how many

children were missing.

Strange. All of them

from the same area.

There were no clues.

We were pulling

our hair out.

How could

we solve these cases?

-We discovered

many children had vanished

in the same manner.

After that, I had the team

map out the areas

where the children

were disappearing from.

We concluded

the children were

disappearing from a

100-meter stretch

near Nithari.

We viewed the area where

the children vanished

as a black hole.

We put a police patrol

in the area, so we could

stop future incidents.

As soon as the patrol was taken away,

The next day,

two girls vanished.

And when we heard this,

we got very angry.

How was this possible?

We saw there was

no patrol there.

Furious.

We were sure something

was happening there.

We believed that

there was a gang

kidnapping girls

for prostitution

or kids for begging.

-In for four months,

we went to

all the red-light districts.

We went to every

red-light area within 500

kilometers of this area.

- Many girls

were rescued because

of the raids.

Twenty-one girls were found.

But none of our

Nithari girls.

We were always anxious.

"Maybe she'll be

found today or tomorrow."

That was the

only thought I had.

If she's not alive,

how can I find her?

Please tell me

about my daughter, Jyoti.

What will happen

to her enemies?

Please stay calm.

He has captured

your daughter.

Her mind has been numbed.

So she's oblivious

to her parents' names.

About Jyoti, please.

How is she?

Will there be justice for her?

You didn't make a decision.

Why don't you? The decision

is stuck because of you.

Where is the water?

She told us

Jyoti isn't here.

She has been murdered.

There is no point

in looking for her.

She won't be found.

- The people

of Nithari were convinced

something was happening

to the girls there.

- In the beginning,

the cops harassed me a lot.

"Kick him out. His daughter

ran away with someone,

and he is

wasting our time."

She left at four o'clock.

I opened the gate

and put her in a rickshaw.

Sector 31. Nithari.

What could've happened?

Her mobile phone

was switched off.

I felt uneasy.

-Somehow, through someone's

recommendation, I met Nand Lal.

His 22-year-old daughter,

Payal, had vanished. And

she had a mobile phone.

At that time, I was in charge

Of electronic surveillance

in Noida.

We asked him about

the last time he spoke with her.

Did she fight with someone?

Was she suicidal?

We looked at it from these angles.

He said,

"No, she was very happy."

He said, "My daughter

was going to Pandher's

house for work."

- There were no clues.

No one was able to give me

any substantial leads.

Suddenly, one day

a local from

the village told me

about the mysterious

happenings at the D5 house.

This house belonged

to a businessman

from Chandigarh,

Moninder Singh Pandher.

He was a well-respected

businessman.

His family

was in Chandigarh.

He owned a big company.

One more person lived

in the D5 house. His

name was Surinder Koli.

He was the servant

of the house.

He came from Uttarakhand.

He looked like a very quiet

and calm person.

There were a lot of

rumors about Pandher.

That he was an alcoholic.

Whenever he was present

in the house,

call girls

used to come over.

I said to Pandher, "My girl,

Payal, came here the

day before yesterday."

He said, "I do not know

any Payal."

We stood there

for a long time,

questioning him.

I was suspicious that

she was either

locked up inside

or had been kidnapped.

We tracked the location

of Pandher's mobile phone

on the date

when she went to his house.

He was in Chandigarh.

We called Pandher.

"Where were you

when this girl called you?"

He said his father

had passed away, so

he was in Chandigarh.

Pandher was a very

respected person.

But we still verified

everything to be true.

We had no clues,

leads, or suspects. We

couldn't do anything.

Then we began to question

Pandher more aggressively.

When we pushed him more,

he broke.

"Payal was a call girl,"

he said.

"I used to pay her

25,000 rupees per night,"

or something like that.

"Whenever I returned home,

I called her.

She stayed the night

and left the next day."

He told us something

very strange.

Payal's father

used to pimp her

for 40,000 rupees a month.

We called Nand Lal back.

He shamelessly admitted,

"Despite what I make

my daughter do,

you still have to find her."

I had completely

given up on my life.

If I have to live,

I have to find her.

If not, I'll die.

I won't go home like this.

Both my wife and I had

given up on life.

I was in no state

to go back home.

We went mad.

But God was with us.

On December 21st,

I got an email

saying Payal's phone

has been tracked.

I was pleased.

The last one said

he got the phone from

a rickshaw puller.

We asked him if the phone

was ringing when he got it.

"Yes," he said,

"it was ringing."

So, if it was ringing,

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