Madhya Pradesh: Self-immolating wife hugs husband, he stabs her dead

BHOPAL: As temperatures soared up to 40 degrees Celsius in the Bundelkhand region on Tuesday night, a woman living in a remote village of Chhattarpur district in

Madhya Pradesh

set herself on

fire

after her husband shifted their only desert cooler to his father’s room.

The blazing woman then grabbed and hugged her husband in sheer desperation, saying he deserved to die with her. The man fought back, stabbing her several times in order to save himself by loosening her iron grip, the

police

said. The woman died of multiple stab wounds and burns. Her body was charred.

“He knifed her to loosen her grip and kept at it until she collapsed,” said Ashok Rawat, head constable posted at the Chhatarpur’s Naugaon police station, who is investigating the case. “She wanted to keep the cooler in her room, but her husband moved it to a window outside his father’s room. This triggered an argument between them.

The deceased has been identified as Shukhwati, 21. She was married to Niranjan Ahirwar, 28 of Chhatarpur’s Dharampura village in Naugaon two years ago. On Tuesday night when Niranjan was dragging the cooler to his father’s room, Shukhwati protested, saying she couldn’t sleep without a cooler in the soaring heat. She asked Niranjan to buy a new cooler for his father on Wednesday if he was so concerned. Niranjan turned a deaf ear and went ahead with moving the cooler anyway. The heated argument took a violent turn after Sukhwanti doused herself with kerosene and lit a match.

“When Niranjan tried to douse the fire, she hugged him, saying ‘Let’s die together’. During the scuffle, Niranjan got hold of a kitchen knife which he used to defend himself,” police said. He then walked in to the Naugaon police station and narrated the incident. The police took him into custody, recorded his statement and referred him to district hospital as he had suffered burn injuries. “As of now we are going by what he said. He has been taken into custody. Investigations would continue to verify his claims,” said the investigating officer.

Senior police officers have asked investigators to cross-examine his version on the basis of circumstantial evidences and not to go by his ‘story’. “It is possible that he might have come up with a cooked up story to get a lesser punishment,” said a police officer.
Noteworthy, that Naugaon is one among the hottest region of Bundelkhand region that suffers extreme heat wave conditions recording a maximum temperature of 47 degrees Celsius. Temperature in Khajuraho, which is about 66 kms from Naugaon, goes up to about 45.5 degrees Celsius in summers.

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