Dalit woman burnt alive on Women's Day in UP

Around the time, when the country was celebrating International Women's Day, a 40-year-old Dalit woman was burnt alive in Uttar Pradesh's Ballia district, about 400 kilometres from here, for her alleged failure to pay the interest on the loan she had taken from private moneylenders.

According to the police sources here on Friday, the woman had suffered 80% burn injuries and was admitted to the hospital, where her condition was stated to be critical.

The culprits, identified as Suddu Singh and Sonu Singh, have been arrested, the police said.

Sources said that the woman had taken a loan of Rs 2,000 from the duo, who dealt in money lending on exorbitant interest rates, a few months back.

''Owing to our poor financial condition, my mother had not been able to pay the interest for the past several months...the money lenders had been insisting on the payment of interest,'' said one of the daughters of the victim.

She said that her mother was sleeping on the veranda outside the house at Jajauli village in the district on Thursday night when the duo reached there and set her ablaze after pouring kerosene on her.

The family members rushed her to the district hospital from where she was referred to the BHU medical college hospital in Varanasi, police said.