Agartala: Tripura police on Friday arrested eight persons for lynching a middle-aged woman in the Behalabari area under the limits of Champhour police station in the Khowai district. The accused persons, reportedly, confessed before the police that the 45-year-old woman was killed for allegedly practising witchcraft and other occult practices, officials said.
According to available information, the woman identified as Koushalya Ghatual (45) and her husband Ranjan Kanda, residents of a Hindustani settlement—Lengtibari, have a long pending dispute with their family members. On Thursday night, youths kidnapped her from the local market and took her to an isolated area. She was killed and buried under an abandoned well dug up for toilet construction.
Speaking on the issue, her husband Ranjan Kanda said, “They (assailants) were chasing both of us. I could somehow evade them, but my wife fell prey to their anger. My elder brother died yesterday, and we had just returned from the cremation. In our tradition, we consume locally made alcoholic beverages during cremation. All of them were with me there and suddenly started chasing us.”
Police said the accused are relatives of the deceased woman. “We received information this morning that a woman was killed by some locals last night. Soon a team of police rushed to the spot and interrogated the locals to trace the whereabouts of the dead body. The body was exhumed from the toilet well and brought to Khowai Hospital for post-mortem. The youth who had been arrested on suspicion of being involved in the case had also confessed that they were responsible for the murder”, OC Champahour police station Rajkumar Jamatia has said.
On being contacted, additional SP of Khowai district Anirban Das said, “There is no mention of the word witchcraft in the complaint but when police were investigating the case, many locals have told us that several people of the village fell ill in the last one week and one of them even died because of occult practices. This is how locals were after the couple”. However, an inquiry on the matter is underway, he told EastMojo.
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The accused persons in the case are identified as Charitra Kanda (40), Mithun Kanda (18), Akash Kanda (18), Kajal Kanda (65), Sanjit Kanda (20), Bimal Kanda (19), Ajit Kanda (25) and Chandan Tanti (35).
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