An area occultist or tantrik from Uttar Pradesh’s Lakhimpur Kheri district allegedly hacked to loss of life a 27-year-old woman from Shahjahanpur who was in a relationship with one other woman she met in school, police mentioned on Tuesday.
Poonam Kumari, a resident of Shahjahanpur, was allegedly lured by the tantrik, recognized as Ram Niwas, with the promise of adjusting her gender, police added.
Kumari and her 25-year-old companion, Preeti Sagar, who lived in Lakhimpur Kheri, met whereas pursuing a bachelor of schooling diploma and have been in a relationship for a couple of months, mentioned Shahjahanpur’s further superintendent of police (ASP) metropolis, Sudhir Jaiswal. “The Lakhimpur Kheri woman’s reluctance in getting married to a person regardless of her household’s a number of efforts, revealed her relationship standing, and invited opposition from each the households who feared social stigma,” he added.
Police have arrested Sagar underneath a number of prices, together with homicide and legal conspiracy.
Lakhimpur Kheri’s Mohammadi police station in-charge, Amber Singh, mentioned the occultist was in contact with Sagar’s mom and informed her that altering Kumari’s gender may assist her get married to Sagar.
He mentioned Kumari was referred to as for the alleged ritual and left her home – roughly 50km away from Lakhimpur Kheri – on April 18. She was reported lacking by her brother Parvinder Kumar on April 26. “The police got here to find out about Preeti Sagar once they scanned the sufferer’s name particulars and found they each had been speaking over telephone for lengthy durations,” mentioned Jaiswal.
The occultist has been taken into police custody. “He confessed to having strangulated Kumari after calling her at a abandoned place on the pretext of performing a ritual to change her gender.”
Niwas fled after disposing of the physique on the banks of the Gomti in a forested space, the ASP mentioned. Police recovered 11 bones from close to Sagar’s home and have despatched it for forensic examination.
Within the FIR, Kumar accused Sagar, her mom Urmila and Niwas of murdering his sister.
A police officer mentioned the FIR was lodged underneath Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 302 (homicide), 120-B (legal conspiracy), and 201 (concealing physique after crime).
The sordid saga underlines the plight of same-sex {couples} in India at this time and reveals that regardless of decriminalisation of same-sex relationships, social stigma continued to canine such unions. Solely a concerted social push to dispel such bias and protracted police motion towards such unscientific practices can mitigate this hurt.