Sunil Kumar was arrested for raping and murdering a three-year-old girl whose body was found on the morning of November 12.
An unemployed 20-year-old man, who occasionally worked as a daily-wage labourer, has confessed to raping and killing at least nine girls aged between three and seven over the past two years, police said on Wednesday.
Sunil Kumar was arrested for raping and murdering a three-year-old girl in Gurugram on November 11. Her body was found in a room in Guga Colony, Sector 66 on the morning of November 12. Police said she was tortured and raped before being bludgeoned to death.
Kumar was identified on the basis of the CCTV footage of the cameras located in a building close to the colony in Sector 66 where the girl's body was found.
A resident of Naugaon Village in Mathura district of Uttar Pradesh, Kumar went missing after the incident and was arrested only on November 20.
In custody, he confessed to raping and killing 8 other children.
"He used to first break the legs of the victims before attempting rape," said Subhash Boken, an assistant sub-inspector and public relations officer with the Gurugram police. "Then he would murder them."
A court on Tuesday granted police remand of the man for eight days, Boken said, adding that he did not yet have a lawyer.
Police have linked three cases of dead children to his statement and are investigating the rest, Boken added.
Four of the cases are in Delhi, three in Haryana's Gurugram, and one each in Uttar Pradesh's Jhansi and Madhya Pradesh's Gwalior.
The man, who was unemployed apart from occasional work as a daily labourer, said he mostly targeted community kitchens such as those distributing free food to the needy.
He would target young girls who went to pick up food, offering them sweets or money, and abduct them, Boken quoted him as having told police.
The man, who was arrested in Jhansi, committed his last crime in Gurugram while visiting his sister in the same slum area where the victim lived, police said.
The case spotlights the rising number of rape cases, where the victims are often young girls. In 2018, the national capital recorded at least six incidents of rape reported every day.
As per statistics provided by the Delhi Police in 2018 till October 15, total number of rapes reported was 1,731, which is six rapes a day at an average till mid-October. Last year, total number of rapes reported in Delhi was 2,146 which were six rapes a day on average.
Reports of brutal rapes and murders, many involving children, are daily occurance. Earlier this year, the Union Cabinet approved an ordinance proposing the death penalty to those convicted of raping children below 12 years of age.
"It is very unfortunate that such cases are still happening in India, despite the government framing a law and approving the death penalty for rape," said Priti Mahara, an official of child rights organisation CRY.
"The police, government officials and society at large need to support the victims and their families."
(With Reuters inputs)
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