Mumbai: In a heart-rending incident that has sent shockwaves across Maharashtra and Telangana, a six-year-old girl allegedly lost her life not to accident or fate, but to her own father’s political ambition.
The victim, Prachi, barely six years old, was allegedly murdered by her father Pandurang Kondamangale, a resident of Kerur village in Maharashtra’s Nanded district, who police say killed his daughter to remove a legal obstacle in contesting local body elections. Pandurang was arrested for allegedly pushing the child into the Nizamsagar canal in Telangana’s Nizamabad district on January 29, abandoning her to a cruel and silent death.
Gold Rate
03 Feb 2026
Prachi was one of Pandurang’s twin daughters. After their birth, he later fathered a son, taking his total number of children to three. Under Maharashtra’s local self-government rules, a person with more than two children is barred from contesting village panchayat elections. Investigators say this disqualification became the decisive barrier to Pandurang’s political aspirations.
Police revealed that before allegedly committing the crime, the accused had tried to give the child up for adoption to make himself eligible to contest the elections. “When the adoption attempt failed, he allegedly chose to eliminate the child,” said Telangana Police Commissioner P. Sai Chaitanya, describing the sequence uncovered during the probe.
Adding another disturbing layer to the case, Kerur village Sarpanch Ganesh Shinde has also been arrested. Police allege that Shinde not only encouraged Pandurang’s political ambitions but also knowingly supported him despite being aware of his legal disqualification, raising troubling questions about moral and ethical collapse in grassroots politics.
The crime came to light after the body of an unidentified young girl was recovered from the Nizamsagar canal under the jurisdiction of Bodhan rural police station in Nizamabad district. In a desperate effort to identify the child, a police constable circulated her photograph on WhatsApp. Within hours, officers in Mukhed taluka of Maharashtra recognised her as Prachi, who had been reported missing days earlier.
During interrogation, Pandurang reportedly gave contradictory statements, further arousing suspicion. His mobile phone location data placed him in Telangana at the relevant time. Following sustained questioning, he allegedly confessed to the crime.
The death of Prachi has left families, villagers and law-enforcement officers shaken. A child who should have known only care and protection instead became the victim of a calculated act driven by ambition, exposing a grim truth: when power becomes paramount, even the most sacred human bonds can be shattered.
