Officers investigating the murders said that the victims, mostly men, had been sodomised before their skulls were crushed with a boulder.

Two men have been arrested and reportedly confessed to police that they had lured 11 men and two women with the promise of alcohol, and had sexually abused their victims before killing them.

Police are searching for the bodies of another four labourers and street dwellers targeted by the men, who are thought to be part of a gang.

S. Prabhakar Reddy, a senior policeman, said that his officers were “recovering bodies one after another” in a case that has sent shockwaves through Hyderabad, the southern city that is home to such leading international technology companies as Microsoft, IBM, Google and Oracle.

The latest murders have emerged during the course of an investigation in Delhi, where the remains of at least 17 people, mostly children, were discovered in storm drains in the upmarket suburb of Noida. The victims had been raped and their bodies dismembered in a grisly crime that has horrified the nation and highlighted the dismissive treatment of the poor by Indian officialdom.

Moninder Singh Pandher, a businessman, and his servant, Surendra Koli, have been charged with the murders and are undergoing narcoanalysis to try to establish a motive and ascertain whether they are responsible for any more killings.

Forensic scientists at a laboratory in the state of Gujarat will inject the pair with truth serum as residents in Noida, angry at the police handling of the case, fear that the body count may rise to 40.

Occupants of a slum near Mr Pandher’s bungalow said that they had pressed the police for two years to investigate the disappearance of 38 children but were ignored because they were from lowly backgrounds.

Grieving parents, mostly migrant workers from eastern India, have vented their anger at the state government in Uttar Pradesh by staging demonstrations at the crime scene, periodically turning to violence by throwing rocks at police.

The public outrage at the apathy of the police has prompted a federal inquiry into the handling of the investigation. Six policemen have already been sacked and three suspended for neglect of duty.

The case has also become an opportunity to score political points in advance of state elections this year. Sonia Gandhi, the leader of the Congress Party and an opponent of the ruling socialist Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh, said that the decision to open an inquiry had come too late. “There is no law and order in Uttar Pradesh,” she said as she met families of the victims at the weekend.

Criticism of Mulayam Singh Yadav, the state’s chief minister, was widespread. Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the former prime minister and a member of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, said that the central government should take control of the investigation.

Brinda Karat, a Communist Party politician, said that the state police had been “totally compromised” in a “most atrocious incident”.

Thugs and their murderous heirs

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