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16-Year-Old Girl Who Shot Her Mother And Brother

The national-level shooter who shot her own family.

By Saral VermaPublished 3 years ago 4 min read
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Photo Courtesy : IANS

On 29 August 2020, the daughter of a senior executive director of India’s railway board shot her mother and brother in cold blood. This unmerciful double murder jolted the capital city (Lucknow) of Uttar Pradesh (India). Why would a 16-year-old girl shoot her family?

(I will be using the noun “girl” to address her because the authorities did not reveal her name)

The girl was a high school junior (Class 10th) student and was not the kind of person who preferred to make friends or go out for gatherings. She relished her own company, preferred reading books, and didn’t desire anyone else around her, in short, she was an indrawn loner. She appreciated her own company and her room was her “world,” she used to spend weeks in her room without getting out and was resentful in going to school, but her parents used to send her anyway for her own welfare.

She had stable hands and keen vision, which helped her gain recognition through national-level shooting competitions, and was a trained shooter familiar with different kinds of weapons. She seldom communicated with her family, but one day she told her brother and mother that she saw “ghosts” in the house, and as expected, no one believed her.

The girl was having hallucinations, and in a country like India, mental illness is not considered an “illness.” People either make fun of these people or don’t believe them, and due to this ignorance by people and the girl’s own family, the condition became worse. She confined herself in the room and formulated her own “world” where she felt safe, no ghosts haunted her there. She used to write all her rights, wrongs, goods, and bads on the walls because troubled people often shift to writing when no one hears what they say.

Crying emoji on the wall of girl’s room (Image via amarujala.com)

During these hard times, she started reading “No Longer Human” by Osamu Dazai, the literal translation of the title from Japanese to English means “ Disqualified From Being Human” and the book deals with the suicidal thought that the author experienced throughout his life. As a matter of fact, Dazai committed suicide after publishing the last part of the book series.

According to doctors, hallucinations become more critical and often lead to destructive actions when the patient enters confinement, which worsens the condition, and that's exactly what happened here. In her delusions, she created some people, they were her friends, albeit only “friends,” and she communicated with them. Sometimes, she lost complete control over her actions and obeyed whatever her “friends” said to her. The movie named “A beautiful mind” based on a great scientist John Nash quite appropriately displays the effects of hallucinations and delusions.

Depression backed up her hallucination and made the condition worse, and her only hiding, i.e., her room, was soon going to be taken away from her. The girl's father was a respectable man, had a responsible designation on India’s Railway Board, and was posted in Delhi (India's capital). He was planning to bring the whole family together and wanted to live with her family in Delhi. So, his wife and son decided to leave their house in 15 days and permanently shift to Delhi.

16-year-old girl’s depressed soul was not ready to believe this, she was not ready to devise her “world,” and after overhearing this news, the girl thought people who are taking her world from her were not “qualified” enough to be called humans, they were “disqualified humans.” Her “friends” supported her thought, or maybe they were the ones who cultivated this thought.

Girl’s mirror (Image via hindi.image18.com)

She went straight towards a bottle of jam, poured jam over her fingers, and wrote: “disqualified human” over the mirror, took out her .22 caliber rifle, and shot it on the mirror. Maybe she was practicing for her other 2 shots. Her mother and brother were in deep naps, she went straight to their room, shot the brother straight in the head, and the second bullet went straight through the heart of the mother and which instantly killed both of them. Highly influenced by her delusional thoughts and the book “No longer human,” she followed the Dazai’s path and tried to commit suicide.

She made multiple cuts on her wrist to end her life but was rescued anyhow. Also, the razor she used to injure herself was recovered later by the police. Evidence recovered by the police, along with the girl’s confession, supported the story, all the fingerprints were matched, and the rifle was recovered. The police declared that the girl intentionally killed her family members, and this cold-blooded murder was the result of her untreated mental illness.

Aftermath

House of the girl (Image via indiatoday.com)

As the father reached the crime scene, he hugged her daughter, and both of them started shedding tears. He comforted her and understood that she didn’t do any of this voluntarily. He understood her illness. After a lot of comforting and counseling, the girl was calm.

The mother and brother's body came out from postmortem and were about to be sent for cremation. The girl demanded to bring their bodies home before cremation. She wanted to see their faces last time. However, when the bodies came, she exhibited no interest in viewing them, and they were eventually sent for cremation.

The girl was sent to a trauma center and was kept in judicial custody under medical supervision for 14 days. There are no latest updates about the matter, but as per Indian law juvenile child is sent back to her guardians after several months of counseling. Also, to maintain the patient and family's privacy, no further coverage of the case was done. It is expected that currently, she is residing with her father under medical guidance.

This incident displays the seriousness of a mental illness, and If left untreated, it can lead to horrific results. Psychologists in India have said, many people experience delusions and hallucinations, but due to the ignorance of people and family, they are never treated.

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About the Creator

Saral Verma

We ain't ever gettin' older.

Medium profile - https://saralverma.medium.com/

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