Fearing ‘evil spirits’, mom & aunts strangle sick boy in Tamil Nadu

TIRUVANNAMALAI: A seven year-old boy who had epileptic fits was strangled by his mother and two aunts who thought he was possessed by evil spirits, at a village in Tiruvannamalai district early on Monday, police said.
K Thilagavathi, 30, of K V Kuppam in Vellore district, and her sisters K Bakialakshmi, 29, and K Kavitha, 28, reached Kannamangalam on Sunday night with her son Sabari, whom they wanted to get ‘treated’ by a Muslim godman at Vandavasi in Tiruvannamalai district.They spent the night in front of the panchayat union complex when the boy developed epileptic fits around 2am. Police said the women believed that he was under the spell of evil spirits and attempted to ‘control’ him using force.
Thilagavathi pulled his tongue while a sister stamped his throat and the other stood on his stomach. A few people who spent the night in front of the complex alerted the police.
The women killed the boy before the police came. When they realized the boy had died, the three turned on each other. The Kannamanglam police detained them.
“We suspect that the three women are mentally unstable. There are a few unexplained deaths in their family, including that of their mother three days ago. Thilagavathy's husband died a couple of years ago. There are frequent deaths in their family in the last two years. We have arrested the three women and commenced a detailed investigation," said Kannamangalam sub inspector C Vijayakumar.