The father of three minor sisters who allegedly jumped to their deaths from a ninth-floor flat in Ghaziabad on Wednesday has spoken up after the horrific tragedy, claiming his daughters repeatedly asked to be taken to Korea because of an online game they were hooked to playing.
However, he claimed no knowledge of the “tasks” that the game required to be completed.
Chetan Kumar, father of Nishika, 16; Prachi, 14; and Pakhi, 12; said they had been playing the game for almost two-and-a-half years, but only came to know about the extent of their addiction from police’s forensic team’s examination of their mobile phones.
Police have said the sisters were “influenced” by Korean content and were highly “addicted” to mobile phone usage and an online Korean task-based interactive game.
“They had been playing the game for two-and-a-half to three years,” he said, adding, “They often said they wanted to go to Korea. I did not know that this game involved such tasks. I came to know about all this only after the police forensic team examined their mobile phones.”
Also Read: 3 sisters jump to death in Ghaziabad; gaming addiction suspected
The police said they received information about three girls having jumped off the balcony of a ninth-floor flat in a tower of Bharat City under the Teela Mor police station limits in the Sahibabad area at about 2.15 am on Wednesday.
On reaching the spot, officials found that the girls had suffered fatal injuries and rushed them by an ambulance to a hospital in Loni, where doctors declared them dead on arrival.
Kumar said the family was asleep at the time of the incident. “My wife was sleeping in the inner room. The girls woke up on the pretext of drinking water, bolted the door from inside and jumped from the balcony,” he said.
Shockingly, the girls allegedly threw the phones outside before jumping. “They threw the phones outside the room. The police later seized them for investigation,” Kumar added.
Asked whether he ever tried to stop his daughters from gaming, he said he had no idea about the nature of the game. “If I had known that such tasks existed, no father would ever allow his children to be part of it,” he said.
However, he recalled his daughter Prachi once telling him that she was the ‘boss’ and that her sisters followed her instructions. “I thought it was just like the games we played in childhood. I never imagined this could happen,” Kumar said.
He also said the girls had not attended school for the past two to three years after failing academically, which made them feel embarrassed and increasingly withdrawn. But, they were bonded emotionally, and did everything together, from eating and bathing to playing, he added.
Investigators recovered a diary containing a handwritten note that read, “Sorry, Papa, I am really sorry,” along with a crying-face emoji.
Officials said the exact circumstances leading to the incident are still being investigated, and statements of family members are being recorded.
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