Indian charged over toddler's death in Australia

Melbourne: On Sunday, a 23-year-old Indian man was arrested and charged over the death of an Indian toddler, whose dumped body was found three days ago in a Melbourne suburb.

Sources said that the wife of Dhillon Gursewak, who has also been arrested, is likely to be charged for helping her husband in disposing off the toddler's body.

Gursewak, who lived in the same house as the three-year-old boy Gurshan Singh Channa and his parents from Punjab, has been charged with manslaughter due to criminal negligence and appeared in an out-of-sessions hearing at St Kilda Road police complex, local media reports said.

"We came to his house thinking of him as our brother. There was noanimosity between us," said Gurshan's father Harjit Singh Channa.

Police also said Gursewak, a part-time taxi driver, was not a relative of the toddler though they lived in the same house.

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"The court heard Dhillon allegedly put the unconscious Channa in the boot of a car and drove around for three hours. It is alleged he then dumped him on the side of a road without checking if he was alive," an Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) report said.

Dhillon was refused bail and will reappear in the Melbourne Magistrate's Court on Tuesday.

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Offering some solace, the local community got together in a local Gurudwara to remember this young boy - even as police investigations narrowed down on their first suspects.

Investigators say Dhillon drove around with little Gurshan in the boot of his car for three hours before dumping him in the grass in Melbourne's northern suburbs. But investigators haven't revealed why was Gurshan in the car and just how did he die?

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Some say Gurshan may have died accidentally and Dhillon panicked instead of trying to save him.

Channa's body was found by a council worker on Thursday night, six hours after he disappeared from a rented property shared by his parents with friends and family here. A total of 12 people lived in the house. (Read: Indian toddler vanishes, found dead in Oz)

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Channa was in Australia on a holiday along with his parents.(See pics: Missing Indian toddler found dead in Oz)

An initial autopsy on the child was inconclusive. A family friend, who was with the couple, said police were very close to completing their investigation. "Police are very close to the person... who has done the crime."

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The Age earlier said it was believed investigation was focussing on the 12 adults who had access to the house in David Street, Lalor, from where Gurshan disappeared.

Detectives released details of a car that was seen in the area where the boy's body was discovered.(Read: Cops hunting for car seen near body)

They were looking for information or any sightings of a green VR or VT Commodore that was spotted in the area around St Johns and Wildwood roads on Thursday afternoon. The family is waiting for police to release the boy's body before deciding when to head back to India. (Read: Parents view body for first time)

Police probing the death had earlier said they are searching for a car seen near the place where the toddler's body was found three days ago.

A green VR or VT Holden Commodore seen in the area where Gurshan Singh Channa's body was found under mysterious circumstances on Thursday has emerged as a key focus of the probe.

The boy's death had threatened to cast a shadow over Australia-India relations following a string of racial attacks against Indian students.

Australian Premier Kevin Rudd had on Friday termed the incident as "horrible" and pledged to get to the bottom of it.

"This is a really horrible story. I've seen the reports this morning, I heard about it late last night," Rudd had said.

(With PTI inputs)