‘Can SC tell if not Koli & Pandher, who killed my child,’ asks Nithari victim’s mother

The narrow lane of Nithari village in Noida’s Sector 31 opens into a silent stretch where the now-crumbling D-5 bungalow stands. The walls are cracked, the paint is peeling, and wild creepers have overrun the boundary. The once-infamous house, the site where skeletal remains of several missing children were unearthed in 2006, looks abandoned.

For the families of the victims, the Supreme Court’s decision to acquit Surendra Koli in his final pending case has reopened wounds they have carried for 19 years.

Koli, who was arrested along with businessman Moninder Singh Pandher, has spent nearly two decades in jail. His release has left the families in disbelief and despair.

“I have been to court so many times in these 19 years that my slippers have worn out,” says 50-year-old Lakshmi Lal, mother of Rachna Lal, who was just eight when she disappeared. “We spent all our money in the courts. My husband went to Rajasthan and Bihar searching for her. The police told me my daughter was a prostitute. Can you imagine saying that to a mother?”

Rachna went missing on her way to school in November 2005. “Both my daughters were bright students,” said Lakshmi. “If Rachna was alive, she and her sister Archana would have been studying together.”

Archana, now 19, is enrolled in Delhi Public School under a scheme for underprivileged children. Since hearing about Koli’s acquittal, Lakshmi said she had not eaten. “He killed my daughter. How can he walk free? If he is innocent, then who killed all those children? The whole world saw the bones and clothes behind that bungalow.”

“Can the SC tell if not Koli and Pandher, who killed my daughter?” asked Lakshmi, standing in front of D-5 wiping her tears. She points to the drain on the other side of the bunglow where the remains were found.

“Every time we try to move on, a new court hearing comes. My stomach burns all the time. I feel like falling into a well and ending it.” Several of the families, once neighbours, have since left Nithari. “We will also leave,” said Lakshmi. “Now, that both Koli and Pandher will walk free, we don’t feel safe here.”

A few houses away, Ashok, who lost his five-year-old son, sits at the entrance of his small shoe shop. His wife and aged parents stand nearby, while his 19-year-old daughter, born days before her brother disappeared, listens silently. “The courts, lawyers, police and media failed to bring them to justice,” he said. “What is the use of talking now? I have accepted that there is no justice for the poor.” His eyes, red and swollen, betray the calm he tries to maintain.

Not far from him lives Ram Kishan, whose three-year-old son disappeared in 2006. His wife refuses to speak to the media anymore. When The Tribune visited, she steps out briefly to adjust drying clothes in the veranda, her gaze fixed on the floor. Their elder son, Aditya, now a college student, says, “I have been hearing about my brother since childhood. My father has spent 19 years talking about him.”

Behind these homes, D-5 stands like a scar on the landscape, the site of a tragedy that the nation once watched unfold in horror. Except for the victim families who continue to live with their memories, the rest of Nithari seems to have moved on.

Children play in the alleys, shops buzz with conversation and residents carry on with their daily routines. Yet when asked for directions, everyone knows where D-5 is and no one hesitates to point the way. For families like Lakshmi’s, time has stood still since 2006. “We have spent money, time and our health for justice,” she said. “Now, the court has freed him. But who will free us from this pain?”

Ironically, on the front wall of the D-5 bungalow, once the site of unspeakable violence against women and children, a small white poster, now faded and peeling, reads in Hindi: “Haath ka kaam karne ke liye mahila evam ladkiyon ki avashyakta hai”. (Women and girls are needed for handwork).