Updated

New Delhi, Nov 8 (IANS): A 16-year-old student of Ryan International School in Gurugram who wanted exams and a scheduled meeting between teachers and parents delayed is the prime accused in the murder of Class 2 student Pradyuman Thakur, the CBI said on Wednesday.

CBI spokesperson Abhishek Dayal said the Class 11 student was detained on Tuesday night after "inspection of the crime spot, scrutiny of CCTV footage, call records, statements and questioning of several people" revealed that he had carried a knife inside the school campus on the day of the crime and used it to kill his junior school mate.

"The weapon used in the commission of crime is a knife which was recovered initially by police in Gurugram (Haryana). It is now with us," Dayal told reporters here.

He said the detained student was weak in studies and "wanted to have examination and parent-teacher meeting postponed". Pradyuman, 7, was his random target.

The parents of the detained student were kept informed throughout the investigation, said the spokesperson for the Central Bureau of Investigation.

The CBI took over the case on September 22 from Haryana Police, nearly two weeks after the Class 2 boy was found with his throat slit in a school bathroom.

The accused will now be produced before the Juvenile Justice Board, where the court is expected to decide whether he is to be treated as a major or a minor as per the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015.

The Haryana Police had earlier claimed that Pradyuman was killed by school bus conductor Ashok Kumar inside the toilet as the boy resisted a bid to sodomise him.

While Ashok Kumar was arrested, Pradyuman's parents and two other staffers have claimed that he was being made a scapegoat.

Earlier Report

Killing of boy in Gurgaon school: CBI detains class XI student on murder charges

New Delhi, Nov 8 (India Today): The Central Bureau of Investigation today detained a Class XI student of Gurgaon, Haryana's Ryan International School in connection with the gruesome murder of seven-year-old Pradyuman Thakur.

The arrest, the details of which are currently sketchy, comes as a major twist in the Pradyuman Thakur murder case, a case that grabbed national headlines. The CBI is expected to release an official statement later today morning.

Up until right now, a school bus conductor at Gurgaon's Ryan International School was believed to be the prime suspect in the murder of the seven-year-old. Days after the killing, Gurgaon Police had arrested the conductor for the child's murder.

Gurgaon Police even claimed they had managed to secure a confession from the conductor - Ashok Kumar. According to the cops then, Ashok had confessed to attempting to sexually abuse Pradyuman and then killing when the boy resisted.

However, the conductor's family members had claimed he was being framed while Pradyuman's parents themselves had expressed suspicion that the Ryan International School was hiding information in the Pradyuman murder case.

It was after sustained pressure from the parents that the ML Khattar government in Haryana transferred the murder case to the Central Bureau of Investigation.

Speaking to India Today soon after news of the Class XI student's arrest broke, Pradyuman's father, Varun Thakur, expressed satisfaction with how the national agency has investigated his child's killing. Varun, however, said he did not been informed about the arrest as yet.

The Murder

The seven-year-old Pradyuman Thakur was found dead inside the washroom of Gurgaon's Ryan International School on the morning of September 8, 2017.

The Class II boy's body was discovered by fellow school students at around 8 am - Pradyuman was found with his throat slit and a knife near his body. Postmortem later revealed that a 18x2-cm neck-to-ear cut was what killed the child.

That very night, Gurgaon Police, which handled the initial murder probe, arrested Ashok Kumar, employed as a bus driver at Ryan International School, Gurgaon.

Police claimed Ashok came across Pradyuman in the washroom just as classes were starting at the Gurgaon school. There, police claimed, Ashok tried to sexually abuse the boy and then slit his throat when the child resisted.