As Biswanath was peddling his rickshaw-van on a village road on December 22, villagers gave him the dreadful news of his daughter being taken to Goillya Health Complex, unconscious. He rushed to the health complex where doctors told him Beauty was dead and the same people who had brought her took the body away. Dr Shafiur Rahman who attended Beauty told The Daily Star she was already dead. "But as a moral responsibility I immediately informed the Agaijhara Police Station about the death of this young girl," Rahman said.

Biswanath, along with his neighbours and relatives rushed to Bahadurpur, two kilometres away and found a lifeless Beauty on a stretcher with her body and clothes bearing traces of blood and wounds. Madhu's family members claimed that Beauty was three months' pregnant and she died of a massive heart attack. They hurriedly prepared for cremating Beauty's body as per Hindu rituals.

A shocked Biswanath looked on without a word but villagers immediately suspected foul play. Only seven months earlier Biswanath was compelled to sell his last belongings to buy a colour television, a wristwatch and household items for the dowry demanded by Madhu and his family. A month ago, Beauty told her mother that her in-laws were constantly demanding Tk 50,000 from her father.

Asking Madhu's family not to cremate the body, Biswanath went to Agailjhara Police Station with the villagers. It was not until the evening of December 23, more than 24 hours following the death of Beauty that Agailjhara police agreed to bring in the body for autopsy. The body was kept overnight on a rickshaw van on the station premises before the police sent it to Barisal Sher-e-Bangla Medical College and Hospital (BMCH) on December 24. All the while Madhu's family members were present with the body not permitting anyone near it. As per Hindu religion, the husband's family then cremated the body after the autopsy. The BMCH Forensic Medicine Department sent some samples of the viscera for chemical test at Mohakhali, Dhaka. The Daily Star learnt the chemical examiner found active traces of "quinine and sodium chloride solution" in the samples.

When contacted, Sub Inspector Shamsul Alam of Agailjhara Police Station said they had taken the initiative for the autopsy on the basis of written complaints by the victim's father and some villagers. There has not been any case in this regard with Agailjhara Police Station, he added.

"As per my investigation, the young girl wanted to undergo an abortion and took wrong doses of drugs," Alam said adding, "She was probably thinking the poor family would not be able to feed the baby once it was born." When this correspondent mentioned about the viscera report, the sub-inspector said his office was yet to receive the report but continued, "during this month of harvest every family has stock of pesticide and therefore suicides are high in the area."

Chairman Afzal Sikder of Rajihar Union told The Daily Star he had heard about the demand of dowry by Madhu's family. "I have also heard that Beauty had gastric problem and she might have died of a heart attack," he said.

Meanwhile a distressed and poor Biswanath is now seeking justice at the offices of different human rights organisations in Dhaka. None has taken up his plea yet.