E-Paper
‘Haunted by spirits’, Gujarat woman jumps into well with 5 children
Police said the woman told them that evil spirits haunted her the moment she closed her eyes. Besides, the family of farm labourers was also facing financial difficulties.
A woman jumped into a well with her five children in a village in Gujarat’s Bhavnagar district because she was being “haunted by spirits” and reportedly facing financial difficulties, police said on Tuesday.
Police said some villagers in Panch Pipla village came to know that a woman was jumping into the well and rushed for her rescue on Monday afternoon. They pulled out the woman and her eldest daughter. Personnel of the fire brigade later fished out the bodies of the four other children.
“We have recovered the bodies of four siblings, including two brothers and two sisters, aged between one and a half year and eight years from a well,” an official of Bhavnagar Police said.
“Their mother Geeta Bhaliya and eldest daughter, Dharmistha (10), were rescued,” the official added.
Police said Geeta told them that evil spirits haunted her the moment she closed her eyes. Besides, the family of farm labourers was also facing financial difficulties.
“She told us that the past two years had been extremely difficult for her financially. She said they often could not manage two meals and that spirits did not let her sleep. She wanted to end her life but was worried about what will happen to her children, so she took them along,” the official said.
The police said she left her home in Royal village with her children on the pretext of going to a temple in a nearby village. She chose a well in a farm at Panch Pipla village, where she worked with her husband a few years ago. She reportedly threw the children into the well one after the other, before jumping in.
Her husband Dharmshi reportedly told the police Geeta believed that someone had performed black magic on her and that she wanted to come out of all the problems she was facing.
