Imphal, June 23: In a bizarre incident, a man strangulated his wife, who was in an advanced stage of pregnancy to death at Thoubal Wangmataba Kiyam Siphai Amureijam Leikai under Thoubal Police Station last night.

The deceased wife has been identified as Nongthombam Ningol Nameirakpam Ongbi Ranjita (24) and killer husband as Nameirakpam Dekan (26) s/o Damu of Thoubal Wangmataba Kiyam Siphai Amureijam Leikai.

Dekan is said to be a BSF constable attached to the 122 Battalion and currently posted at Jammu & Kashmir.

Dekan and Ranjita got married one and half years back and Ranjita was pregnant for 6/7 months.

Dekan returned home from his place of posting on June 17. After the evening meal yesterday, the couple reportedly had a fight.

But at around 10.30 pm, the family members of her husband brought Ranjita to Thoubal District Hospital for treatment claiming that she tried to commit suicide by consuming poison.

But the doctors at the hospital declared her brought dead and suspecting some foul play the hospital authorities reported the matter to the police station at around 10.45 pm.

At around 11 pm, three youths from the side of Dekan�s family went to inform the family members of Ranjita at Thoubal Sabal Tongba Mayai Leikai that she had been admitted to the hospital after consuming poison.

But when N Biren, father of Ranjita arrived at the hospital, her daughter was already found lying death.

On noticing some marks on the neck, Biren got suspicious and filed a complaint with the report.

In the complaint, Biren named not only Dekan but also his father N Damu, his mother Leirikmacha, his sister-in-law Bobby, his elder sister Ambarani, wife of his younger brother Debala as the suspects.

Acting on the complaint Thoubal Police have registered a case and arrested Dekan and his father Damu.

Protesting against the killing, a large number of agitated womenfolks gathered Thoubal Police Station at around 8 am today demanding handing over the killers.

Alerted police personnel controlled the situation and later brought the body of Ranjita to Lilong PHC for post-mortem.

After the post mortem, the unborn male child was separated from the body ifs mother in accordance to the custom of the Meiteis.

An agreement was signed to the effect of hand over the dead bodies to Damu, father of Dekan for taking the responsibility of performing the customary last rites of the deceased mother and her unborn male child.

However, the family members of Ranjita and their supporters protested and stormed at the police station along with pelting of stones demanding to hand over Damu.

To avoid the situation from taking an ugly turn, Damu was taken out by the police in a bullet proof Gypsy and came along with the Tata 407 carrying the dead bodies toward Imphal.

The bodies Ranjita and her unborn son are being kept at the mortuary of RIMS Hospital here.

According to information received by the press, Dekan has confessed to killing his wife by strangulating her in a fit of rage.

The fight started when Dekan expressed suspicious on the fidelity of his wife.

Meanwhile, a joint meeting attended by representatives of Kiyam Siphai Wangmataba Development Association and Meira Paibis of Amureijam Leikai held at the local Amureijam Bamon Mandop with Sorensangbam Ibobi Singh in the chair has formed a Joint Action Committee (JAC) against the killing along with the resolution of finding out if Ranjita was intentionally killed by her in-laws or not.

In case she was killed intentionally, the meeting decided to banish the whole family from the locality and if not then to allow the law to take its own course in giving befitting punishment to the killers.

G Kokila Sharma, AK (O) Chitreshori Devi and AK Rajmani Singh have also been appointed as the president, secretary and vice president respectively of the JAC.

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