Rape and killing of 3 young sisters shocks India

The bodies of the sisters — aged 7, 9 and 11 — were found Feb. 16 in a village well in Bhandara district in Maharashtra after they had gone missing from school two days earlier, said police officer Abhinav Deshmukh. The area is more than 1,000 kilometers (630 miles) south of New Delhi, the capital.

The victims' mother said police did not take the case seriously and did nothing for several days until villagers held protests.

Deshmukh said Friday that 10 teams of 30 investigators were working on the case and that he was confident they would find the killers soon.

Police first dismissed the deaths as accidental, the Press Trust of India news agency reported. The girls' mother accused police of a shoddy investigation and said they did nothing for two days. Enraged villagers forced shops to close, burned tires and blocked a national highway passing in the area for hours earlier this week, demanding justice.

Police eventually registered a case of rape and murder after a post-mortem of the girls found that they had been sexually abused and brutally killed, PTI said.

One police officer has been suspended for not acting promptly, Indian Heavy Industries Minister Praful Patel, who represents Bhandara district in Parliament, said Thursday.