Police have arrested three people on the charge of abetting the alleged suicides of two Brahma Kumari sisters in Agra and formed a team to arrest the main accused.

Ekta Kumari, 37, and Shikha Kumari, 34, were found hanging from the ceiling of their room in the ashram of the Brahma Kumaris — a spiritual organisation — at village Jagner, Agra, on Friday night. Two purported suicide notes were found.

“The police have arrested Tara Chand Singhal, Guddan Kumar and Punam Kumari, three members of the ashram, from different places (in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh) and formed a team to arrest main accused Neeraj Singhal,” said Mahesh Kumar, addition commissioner of police.

The sisters had received training as Brahma Kumaris at the organisation’s Mount Abu ashram in Rajasthan eight years ago and shifted to Jagner in Agra when that ashram was built four years ago, their brother said.

According to the purported suicide notes, written in Hindi, Neeraj had promised the two sisters in Mount Abu that he would move into the Jagner ashram with them once it was built, but later refused to do so. Neeraj also allegedly took Rs 25 lakh from the sisters with false promises.

“Neeraj Singhal has a job in Mount Abu…. He always promised that he would stay with us after the centre (in Jagner) is built but he stopped talking to us. We kept crying for a year but he didn’t listen to us,” Ekta purportedly wrote in her three-page note.

The note says the sisters gave Neeraj a sum of Rs 7 lakh that their father had given them and another Rs 18 lakh that they had collected from donors to the ashram.

The note appeals to other members of the ashram not to misunderstand the sisters. It names a woman from another ashram and alleges that Neeraj has a relationship with her.

The sisters’ younger brother, speaking to reporters in Agra on Sunday, corroborated the women’s allegations against Neeraj.

Abduction arrest

Guwahati: Manipur police on Saturday arrested oneof the suspects involved in the abduction of four Kuki-Zo civilians at Kangchup inKangpokpi district on November 7.

The abduction of the four persons travelling from Churachandpur to Kangpokpi, and two Meitei youths going missing on November 5 from Imphal West district, have fuelled fresh tension in the state which has remained on the edge since May 3 when violence broke out between the Kuki-Zo and the Meitei communities.

Police said on Saturday night that raids were continuing to arrest the other suspects involved in the abduction incident.

Sources said bodies of two of the abducted persons had been recovered but they were yet to be official identified.

UMANAND JAISWAL