10 killed in witch hunting, force conversion to Islam

Guwahati, Aug 22 (UNI) At least ten persons have been killed on the suspicion of being 'witch' in various parts of the Bodoland areas in the past two weeks, forcing some to adopt Islam.

The gory incident of hacking to death returned to haunt again last night when five of two families were killed near Kachugaon in Kokrajhar district. Prior to that in separate incidents five others were killed in Baska, Udalguri, Chirang and Kokrajhar district, police source said.

This has been officially confirmed and FIR has been lodged against each case but the police have not been able to do much as the entire community of the particular area were involved.

In the Bodos areas witch hunting is very much prevalent as villagers fed up with series of diseases or related death in the village, first segregates a few members of the same village on the suspicion of practicing witchcraft and then they are hacked to death to get rid of all the problems.

The last night incident at Kachugaon saw five of two families were hacked to death by angry mob. The first incident took place at Nandipur village and other incident at Vijayanagar.

The district administration, unable to root out the problem has now decided to levy collective fine on the villagers to check the practice. ''I am moving to higher authorities,'' said an angry Baska District magistrate Anwaruddin Chaudhury.

In fact the gory and secret practice of witch hunting amongst the tribal societies of lower Assam has forced a family to convert into Islam to protect their own life.

The bizarre incident came to light only now when the tribal society have tried to get the converted family back amongst them. In fact the shocking incident came into light when a court official of Dhubri district stumbled upon the case.

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