Lockdown saw murders treble in Ludhiana, seven victims killed by kin

Three women were killed by their husbands on suspicion of infidelity; 65-year-old man killed son for not doing chores.

If coronavirus disease didn’t kill them, as many as seven people were murdered by their family members since the lockdown was imposed in the district on March 23.

A man was held for stabbing his wife with scissors on June 30 for moving court against domestic violence. (Shutterstock)

During the lockdown, Ludhiana city also saw a threefold rise in murder cases. Figures from the police department reveal while eight people were killed before the lockdown, between January 1 and March 22, the number of those murdered rose to 27 with 19 more homicides.

Among these 19 cases, seven victims (37%) were allegedly killed by their own family members, including their husbands, wives and fathers, whom they were isolated at home with.

Police investigation found marital discord behind five of these seven cases, including three uxoricides, where men killed their wives on suspicion of infidelity.

In another case, a man stabbed his wife to death with a pair of scissors on June 30 after she moved court against domestic violence on June 30.

A woman had strangled her husband to death after he tried to rape their daughter in drunken stupor in Sundar Nagar on the intervening night of May 23 and 24. She was arrested.

A 75-year-old retired Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) official was killed by his wife and son following a disagreement in C Block of the posh BRS Nagar on June 10. Police had arrested his wife and son.

In a case of filicide, not pitching in house chores had led to the murder of a 22-year-old man by his 65-year-old father, who attacked him with a pan and a wooden log in Jagir Colony of Tibba on June 6. The accused had also tried to burn the body to conceal the crime.

Police had solved a Rahon Road case where an elderly man had his nephew murdered by hiring a contract killer following a monetary dispute. All accused were arrested.

City-based psychiatrist Dr Rajiv Sharma attributed the diminishing marital ties to increase in time being spent on social media. “Like others, couples are also spending long periods of time on social media, instead of giving each other attention, which leads to differences and even suspicion,” he said.

“The police investigate all murder cases thoroughly to establish the motive. There are many factors for rise in murders within the family, including doubt on partners and depression, which cause rift between couples,” said deputy commissioner of police (DCP, Headquarters) Akhil Chaudhary.

MURDERS DRIVEN BY MONEY

Eyeing easy money, two teenagers had kidnapped their 16-year-old friend on July 8 for Rs 50,000 in ransom, but bludgeoned him to death with bricks after things didn’t go as they planned. They were tracked and arrested after they called the victim’s father anyway for the money. They were booked for murder by the Salem Tabri police.

Three people were killed in separate cases of robbery during the lockdown.

KILLED BY CO-WORKERS

The lockdown also saw two cases of murders by co-workers, where liquor was involved.

On March 2, a courier company employee had bludgeoned his colleague to death with a bamboo stick and iron rod at their office at Gill Road. The duo had consumed liquor together before the incident.

More recently, on July 7, a sewing machine factory worker murdered his co-worker for chiding him to coming to work in an inebriated condition in Guru Gobind Singh Nagar.

In other cases, police had established old enmity as the driving factory behind two murders, while a Salem Tabri woman was killed after she was attacked with bricks by her neighbours in a case of road rage.

UNSOLVED CASES

Mystery shrouds two murders, including that of a 42-year-old woman of Bhai Randhir Singh Nagar, a tony locality in the city.

The woman was alone in her rented accommodation, while her husband was stuck in Nanded, Maharashtra, due to the countrywide lockdown. Police are still looking for clues behind the murder as nothing was stolen from the house.

The discovery of a 52-year-old labourer’s body in Gonspur Road, Humbran, also remains unsolved.