Thaindian News

Ranchi, Jan 25 (IANS) In a shocking case of matricide, a man axed his mother to death in Jharkhand Tuesday suspecting that her black magic was causing illness to his wife, police said.The murder took place in Jama near Dumka. According to police, Vishnu Hembrom quarrelled with his mother over his wife’s illness and at the end of the heated argument the son axed his mother to death.

Hembrom and his wife, who has been ill for a long time, were living separately. It was a witch doctor who told Hembrom that his wife’s illness was caused by his mother’s black magic. The son used to argue with his mother over the issue on several occasions, the police said.

According to police data, over 700 people, a majority of them women, have been killed in Jharkhand in the last 12 years after being branded witches or black magicians. In most cases, the witch doctors who adviced the people to kill managed to escape as nobody named them out of fear.