Two bodies found in Indian 'child sacrifice' house

Police in central India on Thursday investigated a home where two child sacrifices allegedly took place, casting a spotlight on witchcraft and occult beliefs that persist in some remote areas.

Parents of a two-year-old boy had alerted authorities after he went missing while playing on the street in the Durg district of the state of Chhattisgarh, about 45 kilometres (30 miles) from the capital Raipur.

Police raided the house of the alleged witchdoctor on Wednesday and found the boy's body, before further searches of the property revealed the skeletal remains of a six-year-old girl.

The accused man confessed to killing both children to acquire "occult power and good fortune," police said.

"The witchdoctor, his family and six other people have been arrested on suspicion of holding human sacrifices," Durg police chief Amit Kumar told AFP.

Kumar added the house contained a "worship room" and that the man had originally said blood stains were the result of him slaughtering a goat.

The second body was thought to be a girl who was abducted nearby in March. Her body was found buried inside the house beneath a trident symbol.

Human sacrifices occasionally make headlines in deeply religious and superstitious India, and usually occur in poor areas where some people revere practitioners of black magic.

In April, in the last widely publicised case of suspected human sacrifice in India, a decapitated body of a factory worker was found in a temple in the eastern state of West Bengal.
 

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