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Police Find Children's Remains Behind a House in Noida and Arrest Its Owner and His Servant

Parents in Nithari village had reported children missing for two years. The Allahabad High Court later overturned convictions against both men.

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Illustration of police officers holding back a crowd in a misty lane of concrete houses on the edge of a north Indian city. Not an actual scene from the case.

Families in Nithari village, on the edge of Noida, had been reporting children missing for two years. On December 29, 2006, police recovered skulls and bones behind a house in Sector 31 and arrested two men.

Police took Surendra Koli, a domestic servant, into custody while investigating a missing-person case, and his employer, businessman Moninder Singh Pandher, was arrested outside the house, D-5, the same morning. Police said Koli confessed and led them to remains in an enclosed gallery behind the house, though a court later noted that digging had already begun there when police arrived, with a large crowd present. Early reports said the remains of at least eight children had been found. Police declined to give a figure, saying only DNA tests could identify the missing children.

Parents carrying photographs of their children gathered at the site and accused the police of ignoring their complaints. On December 31, two beat constables were suspended for dereliction of duty over allegations that officers had refused to act on reports of missing children. The investigation was transferred to India's Central Bureau of Investigation on January 9, 2007.

Koli was later convicted and sentenced to death in a series of cases. In October 2023, the Allahabad High Court reversed his conviction and death sentence in one of them, holding that the prosecution had failed to prove his guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

Police said Koli was taken into custody on December 29, 2006, while Koli later said he had been brought to a Noida police station on December 27.

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