India, June 8 -- The slippers were still lying at the doorstep. The sofa, vases and other belongings remained exactly where they had been left. When I visited the Gurugram home of chartered accountant Vivek Aggarwal on Sunday, it felt as if the family had stepped out only briefly and would return at any moment.

Last week, Vivek Aggarwal, his wife Tarjani Aggarwal, their two daughters and his elderly mother had left the house to stay at a bed-and-breakfast in Delhi's Malviya Nagar so they could remain close to Vivek's father, Radhe Shyam Aggarwal, who was admitted to an ICU in a nearby hospital. Family members said doctors had given him only a few days to live. But the family never returned home. Instead, their charred bodies were brought...