Sunday, January 1 2006 15:43 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Hajipur: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar today (Jan 1, 2005) ordered a high-level administrative inquiry into the burning alive of six members of a family in Raghopur block of Vaishali district, which falls in the constituency of leader of the opposition Rabri Devi.

''A high-level administrative probe will be conducted into the incident. The inquiry will also go into the role of the officer-in-charge (OC) of the Raghopur police station besides those of block development officer and circle officer. Those found guilty will be severely punished,'' Kumar said after meeting the relatives of the deceased at Rampur-Shyamchand village, the site of the gory incident, about 40 km from the district headquarters.

The OC Nasriuddin Khan has already been suspended.

Kumar said if any link of the OC with the killers was confirmed, the government would dismiss him from the service.

Kumar, accompanied by Revenue Minister Ramnath Thakur, said the burning alive of six members of an extremely backward class family after locking them in a room of a thached house was 'gruesome' and it has 'sullied' the image of the state.

''Those who committed this crime are inhuman,'' he said.

Kumar said the kin of the aggrieved family would be adequately compensated besides providing a dwelling under the Indira Awas Yojna.]

Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) president and Railway Minister Lalu Prasad and Rabri Devi are expected to visit the village later in the day.

A woman and her five children were burnt alive in Rampur-Shyamchand village for apparently refusing to withdraw a complaint of theft of a buffalo in September last year.