In a heart rending incident, a woman set ablaze her three grown up daughters after dousing them with petrol and committed self-immolation, unable to bear the torture by her drunkard husband that she begot three daughters at Kizhavaneri in Mudukulathur block on Sunday night.
M. Ramar (38), wife of Murugesan, an auto-rickshaw driver, dejected after her husband tortured her every day after consuming liquor, took her three daughters — Muthuselvi (18), Muthupriya (16) and Bavani (10) to her mother’s place at Ilamchembur in this district, but killed them and herself before visiting her mother, police said.
On reaching a bank of a oorani (waterbody), near Kizhavaneri, Ramar set fire to her three daughters after dousing them with petrol before committing self immolation by pouring petrol on her.
M. Muthuselvi, a B. Sc second year student of Alagappa University, and M. Bavani, studying class V, were charred to death on the spot, while their sister M. Muthupriya, studying plus two, succumbed to the burns on being taken to the Government Rajaji Hospital in Madurai late on Sunday night and Ramar at the early hours of Monday, police said.
The family was residing at Anna Nagar in Karaikudi in Sivaganga district. After a quarrel with her husband on Saturday night, Ramar left the house on Sunday with her daughters for her mother’s place.
After travelling to Paramakudi in a bus, Ramar bought two litres of petrol from a pumping station there in a can and proceeded to Ilamchembur in a bus. After getting down at Kodalendal, they walked to the oorani on the outskirts Ilamchembur and took the extreme step.
On hearing the cries, villagers rushed to the spot and found Ramar with burns in the water inside the oorani and the three girls on the bank. Soon Mudukulathur Inspector of Police Mookan reached the spot and shifted them to the hospital in an ambulance.
In a dying declaration, Muthupriya told the police that her mother took the extreme step unable to bear her father’s torture. Preliminary police investigation revealed that Murugesan tortured Ramar for she had given birth to three daughters. He started torturing her more after the birth of Bavani, police added. Police ‘secured’ Murugesan and launched a detailed investigation.
