Patna, India - A young widow, driven by poverty and inability to provide food for her children, burnt herself to death in a Bihar village, officials said on Thursday. This is among half a dozen suicides in the state due to hunger in the last six months.
Source: Gulf news
- Khatoon, in her early 30s, a resident of Baddha Nuaon village in Kaimur district, some 170 kilometres from here, allegedly immolated herself after going without food for many days as she found no work since early January.
- "She along with her children were left in the lurch, the village head and government officials did not help her and hunger forced her to commit suicide," Kaimur District Board vice-president Raushan Ara said.
- Jawed Ahmad, a villager, said that Khatoon's three children — six-year-old Salim, four-year-old Munna, and two-year-old Dabloo — had gone without food for days.
- "Khatoon was upset when they demanded food but she could not fulfil their demand and she immolated herself," he said.
- Ara said that Khatoon worked as a maid and a farm labourer but for over two months she had failed to get any work and people were reluctant to hire her for other jobs as she was physically weak.
- "She was neither provided work and food by the village headman nor supported by well-off villagers," Nurul Hasan Ansari, a social worker said.
- Ara and Ansari donated money for her last rites after they were informed by some villagers. Ara said that Khatoon's husband Massin Dhobi died of tuberculosis last year.
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