Woman dies after spurned lover attacks her with acid in Telangana

A 31-year-old married woman succumbed to severe burns late on Thursday, a day after a suspected spurned lover threw acid on her in Telangana’s Warangal district.

According to Warangal (urban) police, B Madhuri of Mattewada area in the city, was found in an unconscious state with severe acid burns on her face, hands and other parts of the body on the outskirts of Garimillapalli village in Inavolu block on Wednesday evening.

Passers-by, who noticed her writhing in pain with her hands tied behind her back, immediately informed the police and shifted her to Mahatma Gandhi Memorial government hospital in the city, where she succumbed to the injuries in the late hours of Thursday.

Based on the information given by Madhuri’s sister Anjali, the police took three persons – Chandu alias Chandrasekhar, an auto driver and his friends Annil and Rakesh—into custody on Thursday morning. During the interrogation, the accused reportedly confessed to the crime.

According to the police, Madhuri, a mother of a three-year-old boy, was staying with her mother in Hanamkonda and working as an attendant at a petrol bunk at Mattewada after being separated from her husband a couple of years ago.

For the last few months Chandu had been stalking her and harassing her and insisting to marry her.

Police said on Wednesday evening, Chandu forced Madhuri into his auto rickshaw and took her to the outskirts of Garimillipalli village. En route, he picked up his two friends. After they reached a secluded spot, Chandu allegedly put pressure on her to marry him and when she refused, he tied her hands behind her back, attacked her with a screw driver and poured acid all over her body, before fleeing the place.

Anjali said they had lodged a police complaint against Chandu last week as he was pestering and threatening Madhuri to marry him.

Despite a Supreme Court ban on its open sale, acid is easily available in the state and is often being used by jilted or spurned lovers to take revenge on women who spurn sexual advances or reject marriage proposals.

Acid attack was made a separate category of crime in 2013 amid spike in such incidents across the country.

In July this year, a 22-year-old woman Kabeera Begam, a helper in a ceiling fan manufacturing company at Subhash Nagar in Hyderabad, was attacked by her colleague Pradeep with whom she had an affair.

When she decided to part ways with him, Pradeep got angry and threw acid on her face.