Grief and disbelief gripped the families of victims of the 2006 Nithari serial killings, a day after the Supreme Court acquitted Surendra Koli, the only convict in the case, and ordered his immediate release if not required in any other matter.

The anguished parents of the deceased children said they have now “accepted defeat” and left their hopes for justice “in the hands of God”.

“I have no hope now. We have accepted our defeat. The rest depends on God,” 67-year-old Jhabbulal, father of a 10-year-old victim, said at his home in Noida’s Sector 31.

The incident had come to light with the discovery of the skeletal remains of eight children from a drain behind businessman Moninder Singh Pandher’s house at Nithari in Noida on December 29, 2006. Koli was the domestic help at Pandher’s house

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