The three-year-old girl, who was found dead in a sugarcane field in Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur Kheri, was raped before murder

The three-year-old girl, who was found dead in a sugarcane field in Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur Kheri, was raped before murder, a senior police officer said on Friday.

This is the third such incident in the district in as many weeks.

Rape

The girl's body, which bore injury marks on the head, was recovered from the vicinity of her village in Singahi area on Thursday after she went missing on Wednesday, police said. 

"The postmortem report has confirmed rape. I am with family members right now. Seven of our teams are working on the case. I myself going for combing in sugarcane fields and strict action will be taken against the accused," Superintendent of Police, Satyendra Kumar Singh said.

Case registered

In his complaint to police, the girl's father had alleged that Lekhram, a resident of their village, had abducted and killed the child due to an old enmity with his family.  

A case of murder was lodged against the accused.