Prajukti Roy

Calcutta, Nov. 26: Ten-year-old Prajukti Roy died from burn injuries, which her parents and police believe were caused while trying to imitate a dance sequence from a Bollywood pot-boiler.

The Class VI student (picture on top), a resident of Deshpran Sashmal Road, was taken to SSKM Hospital with 80 per cent burns on Tuesday. She died around 3.30 am the next day.

Her relatives said she had “an aptitude for accurately copying dance sequences of films that she saw on television. “She was somewhat addicted to TV and spent a lot of time on it. For fear of her mother and me, she watched it secretly on most occasions,” said her father Prodyut.

On Monday, while the family was watching television, Prajukti was engrossed imitating a heroine who kept dancing despite her clothes catching fire.

The next day, some time after Prajukti sat down to study in her room at 7 pm, her mother Archana heard her scream. The door was locked from inside and she banged on it along with her uncle. After some time Prajukti opened the door herself and rushed out. “She was burning, her hair was alight,” her mother said, shivering with shock.

Police eliminated possibilities of suicide or foul play, an investigating officer said. “The nature of injuries, especially the burns similar to the dance sequence suggested that she died trying to enact the film part.”