A missing person case in Bihar's Aurangabad district has turned into an outcry over alleged police negligence after a 72-year-old man's body was pulled from a river three days after he vanished. Rajendra Prasad Gupta, a cloth trader living in the Jamhor police station area, had been missing since July 16, 2026, and his body was recovered from the Batane river near Pawai on Sunday afternoon. His family says the local police's inaction is directly responsible for his death.
Police Refused to Register a Missing Complaint
Gupta ran a cloth business in Jamhor and stepped out of his house on July 16, never to return. His relatives searched the neighbourhood on their own before heading to the Jamhor police station that evening to file a missing person's report. According to the family, officers at the station turned away their complaint and told them to look for the elderly man themselves instead of registering a case.
Dial 112 Picked Him Up That Same Night, But Nobody Told the Family
The family later learned that a Dial 112 patrol had actually found Rajendra Prasad wandering on the night of July 16 itself. The officers recorded his details and handed him over to the Nagar police station. Yet neither the Dial 112 team nor the Nagar station ever called the family to inform them that the missing man had been located.
He Walked Out of the Station and Vanished Again
The family alleges that on the morning of July 17, Rajendra Prasad walked out of the Nagar police station premises while officers were present, and nobody stopped him or tracked where he went. Two days later, on Saturday, his body was found floating in the Batane river.
Anger Boils Over at the Postmortem House
Around 5:30 pm on Sunday evening, the grieving family reached the postmortem facility at Sadar Hospital and confronted officials there. They said that if the police had passed on information in time, Rajendra Prasad would still be alive today. The family squarely blamed the negligence of personnel from Dial 112, Jamhor police station and Nagar police station for his death.
Officers Confronted, Demand for Action Grows
Jamhor station house officer Suryaveer Gupta and Nagar station house officer Baban Baitha, who reached the spot, faced sharp criticism from the family. Jamhor resident Jitendra Prasad Gupta and Jitendra Gupta, the state spokesperson of the BJP's business wing, called the episode a case of gross negligence and demanded action against the responsible policemen. The body was handed over to the family after the postmortem was completed, while both station house officers avoided commenting on the allegations. Police have opened an investigation into the case.
