Police in Ludhiana said a seven-month pregnant woman in Jhandi village was killed as her husband and brother-in-law allegedly pressed on her stomach till the foetus, which they believed was female, came out, The Indian Express reported on Tuesday.

Irvinder Singh, the husband, and his brother Nirmal Singh dumped the 32-year-old’s body and the foetus in the fields near their family home and hid them with a quilt and soil, according to the police. Station House Office of the Sidhwan Bet Police Station Paramjit Singh said they had tied the woman’s hands during the crime. “We have recovered the body and foetus from the fields,” he said, adding that the woman’s mother-in-law is bed-ridden.

The woman’s father, Ravinder Singh, told the police that a villager had informed him on Monday about hearing his daughter’s cries late on Sunday night. He said the family had not been able to give him a convincing answer about his daughter’s whereabouts, and that they had cleaned the blood stains from her room by the time he had reached their house.

Ravinder Singh also alleged that his daughter had been physically and mentally tortured after the couple had their first girl child. He claimed the husband had forced her to undergo a sex determination test and had been pushing her to get an abortion after they found out they were having a second daughter.

The police have arrested the husband and his brother on the basis of the father’s complaint. They are on the lookout for the doctor who helped them with the “abortion”, according to Hindustan Times. However, the station house officer told The Indian Express that they were investigating whether a doctor or midwife had been called at all.

In the FIR filed in the case, the two accused have been charged with murder, causing a miscarriage without a woman’s consent, causing a death by an act intended to cause a miscarriage and an act intended to a birth or cause a child’s death after birth.