The bodies of two Dalit girls were found hanging from a tree near Bhagautipur village in Uttar Pradesh’s Farrukhabad district on Tuesday, the Deccan Herald reported. The girls were aged 15 and 18.

The father of one of the two girls alleged that both of them were murdered, according to Hindustan Time. However, the police said prima facie it appeared that the two girls died by suicide.

The bodies of the two girls were found in a mango orchard, Hindustan Times quoted Farrukhabad Superintendent of Police Alok Priyadarshi as saying. Both of them were close friends and neighbours, and belonged to the same community, he said.

“We received information this [Tuesday] morning from Bhagautipur village about two girls’ bodies hanging from a tree,” Priyadarshi said. “A police team was quickly dispatched to the scene,”

He added: “One body was found hanging from one end of a dupatta and the other body from the other end.”

According to Priyadarshi, the two girls went missing after they had gone to a temple in the village on the occasion of the Hindu festival of Janmashtami at around 9 pm on Monday.

The girls’ families searched for the two of them the entire night, Priyadarshi said. Their bodies were found hanging from the tree during the early hours of Tuesday morning.

“One mobile phone was found near the same tree, while one SIM card was found from the belongings of one of the girls,” the police officer said. “The police are investigating the case thoroughly.”

An unidentified police official also told the Deccan Herald that a special team had been formed to investigate the matter.

The father of one of the girls said that the two girls had first gone out together at 7.30 pm on Monday, after which they had returned home, according to the Hindustan Times.

“And then at 9 pm they went again to the temple,” he said. “When they did not come back, I went to the house of my sister who lives nearby [to see] if my daughter was there.”

On not finding either of them, the father said that he went to the village looking for them. “Around 5 am my sister-in-law who had gone to attend the call of nature came rushing and told us about the two bodies hanging from the three.”

He claimed: “Both were murdered and their bodies were hung with a dupatta.”