A 42-year-old woman in Rajasthan, India, was married for 20 years but remained childless, leading to years of disdain from her husband's family. Their cruelty escalated to the point where they placed her on a pile of cow dung cakes and burned her alive.
According to The Times of India, the incident took place on Tuesday (16th) in Rajasthan’s Deeg District. The victim, Sarla, married her husband Ashok in 2005.
Police received a report around noon on Tuesday that Sarla was being burned, prompting a team of officers to rush to the scene. However, they were stopped and attacked by the local villagers.
The assaulted officers had to call for headquarters backup. A support team led by senior officers arrived, pulled the victim’s body from the burning flames, and took it to the Deeg District Hospital mortuary for autopsy, after which the body was handed over to her family for funeral arrangements.
District police confirmed that the husband’s family and several villagers were burning Sarla, and when police tried to intervene, they were attacked.
Police spokesperson Sharma stated that preliminary investigations found the suspects tried to destroy evidence and that was why they attacked the responding officers.
Deeg Police District Chief Bakhasha said that the case is being treated as murder, destruction of evidence, and assaulting public servants.
He added that after the incident, the husband’s entire family and several villagers had fled the area. Police have been stationed in the locality to investigate and apprehend the suspects.
In addition, the victim’s brother Vikram alleged that his sister Sarla had endured prolonged harassment for being childless.
He also accused the husband’s parents, as well as an elder brother and his wife — a total of six people — of being suspects in the case.