In a suspected case of human sacrifice, a man murdered a five-year-old girl by slitting her throat and offered her blood on the steps of a temple in Chhotaudepur district of Gujarat on Monday, police said.

The accused, Lala Tadvi, abducted the victim from her house at Panej village in the tribal-dominated district in the presence of her mother in the morning, Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Gaurav Agrawal said.

Tadvi, who was later arrested, took the girl to his house and inflicted fatal injuries on her neck using an axe, Agrawal said.

“He then collected the blood gushing out of the girl’s neck and offered some of it onto the steps of a small temple located in his house even as her mother and a few other villagers looked in shock, but could do anything as he was wielding an axe,” the police officer said.

The accused does not appear to be an occult practitioner, and the exact motive behind the murder was not yet clear, Agrawal said.

“The accused appears to be mentally unstable,” he said.

On a complaint of the girl’s family, an FIR is being registered against Tadvi under sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita pertaining to murder and abduction, Agrawal informed. 

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)