60-yr-old woman tortured to death

Police yesterday arrested seven people at Mundumala in Tanore upazila for allegedly torturing an indigenous woman to death.

Locals claimed the arrestees on Tuesday night beat the 60-year-old Santal woman, Fulmoni, to death inside a local church while "trying to free her from the spell of an evil spirit".

Sub-inspector Humayun Kabir, in-charge of Mundumala police investigation centre, said they recovered Fulmoni's body from the yard of John Merry Day and Night Church around 6:00am yesterday.

Later, they arrested teacher Bilashi Soren, 30, of a school of the Catholic church, his three minor girl students and three other students of a nearby college -- Boby Mardi, 22, Pias Hemrom, 21, and Ratan Hasda, 21.

The victim was the wife of Jhaden Mardi of Chuniapara village. She was beaten and her body bore numerous injury marks, said the police official.

Police, quoting witnesses and locals, said some inhabitants of the village on Tuesday evening took Fulmoni to the church, saying she had fallen under "the spell of an evil spirit". She had been "behaving abnormally" for the last few days.

The accused, who were offering their evening prayers that time, started to slap and beat her in front of the villagers in the name of her treatment. The torture on her continued for hours and at one point, she became unconscious.

She died later at night. On information, police went to the church and recovered the body.

Later, Shefali Hemrom, daughter of the victim, filed a murder case against the seven accused with Tanore Police Station.

She said her mother had been converted to Christianity recently.

Talking to this correspondent, Michael Koraiya, father of the church, admitted that he had let the accused carry on with their "treatment." He claimed that they were successful in such cases in the past.

Md Misharul Arif, superintendent of Rajshahi police, said they were investigating the case and would arrest Michael, if his involvement in the crime was found in the probe.

Anwar Hossain, officer-in-charge of Tanore Police Station, said they mentioned the age of the arrested girls while sending them to court, and the court would decide about them as per law.