Agartala, Sep 23 (IANS): Almost two weeks after two teenaged girls were found dead in Sipahijala district of Tripura, police Tuesday said they did not commit suicide but were murdered after being gang-raped.

"A police team led by additional superintendent of police of Sipahijala district Sharmistha Chakraborty last week arrested three youths who admitted they raped two tribal girls Sep 11 and then killed them," a police officer said.

Earlier police had said that the girls, both students of class 10 of the Takarjala higher secondary school, had committed suicide after their hostel superintendent and parents rebuked them for using mobile phones.

"According to the medical reports, there was no sign of rape of the two girls," a police official had told reporters Sep 13.

After the Tribal Students Union, a tribal student wing of ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist, organised a protest rally in the tribal dominated Takarjala areas, police authority ordered a reinvestigation into the crime.

Police is also probing the role of the doctors who earlier gave wrong medical report.