Woman’s death: Kin hold protest outside police station

Our Correspondent

Mahilpur, October 16

Family members of a woman, who died of poisoning on Tuesday, protested outside the police station, alleging the involvement of the police in a case of forcible poisoning of a married woman of Hakumatpur village on Wednesday.

The protesters demanded that husband of deceased’s sister-in-law should also be included in the FIR and her sister-in-law should be arrested. The protest caused an hour-long traffic jam on Chandigarh-Hoshiarpur road, leading to long queues of vehicles on both sides of the road. The blockade was lifted after Garhshankar DSP assured protesters of immediate action against the accused.

According to the information, the police had deceased’s in-laws on charge of forcible poisoning. The police had arrested her mother-in-law, father-in-law, brother-in-law and wife of brother-in-law while her sister-in-law could not be arrested and her husband had not been named in the FIR.

Raman, wife of deceased’s brother, and Ashok Kumar, another relative, said they made complaints regarding the case to the police in the past but the police did not listen. They said investigation officer Des Raj did not take any action and had always been taking the side of the other party. They said they would not cremate the deceased till all accused were arrested.

They said while Poonam, the deceased, was being poisoned, her son was recording the whole incident but the phone was snatched by her sister-in-law and the police had not tried to recover the mobile.

DSP Satish Kumar said the police would arrest all accused by tomorrow. Inspector Iqbal Singh said four of the five accused had been arrested and the police was doing all it can, without any pressure.