The Sarjapur police on Saturday arrested an 18-year-old boy for allegedly killing his 12-year-old brother following a trivial row over a mobile phone on Wednesday (May 18).
The deceased, Pranesh, son of Basavaraju and Chennamma, had come to visit his parents during his vacations. He was in the labour shed while his parents and elder brother went out for construction work.
On Wednesday evening, Pranesh was found dead with a head injury at the eucalyptus grove behind the shed. Based on a complaint by Basavaraju, the police registered a case of murder and took Shivakumar, the victim’s elder brother, into custody for questioning.
According to the police, Shivakumar was the last person who had seen his brother alive, and he was the first to see the dead body in the groove. Detailed questioning led Shivakumar to confess to the crime, said the police.
According to him, Pranesh used to take his mobile phone and start playing games, never returning it. Shivakumar used to fight with Pranesh often to get his phone back.
On Wednesday, when Shivakumar came home to have lunch while his parents were at the construction site, Pranesh picked up his phone and started playing with it. Shivakumar demanded his phone back, but Pranesh did not return it. Enraged by this, Shivakumar allegedly picked up a hand-held hammer and hit Pranesh.
A blow caused Pranesh to collapse on the ground and breath his last. Scared, Shivakumar dragged his body into the backyard of the labour shed, dumped it and returned home to clean up the area.
While the family is from Andhra Pradesh, Shivakumar was a school dropout and his parents took him along to work with them while younger son Pranesh was left at his maternal grandmother’s house to complete his 7th standard.
