Arunachal BJP MLA’s sister among 5 arrested on charges of using children for black magic

india

Updated: Apr 27, 2017 14:26 IST

A BJP MLA’s sister who is married to an IAS officer, her elder sister and three others have been arrested by Arunachal Pradesh police on charges of illegally confining children to allegedly perform black magic.

The East Siang district police arrested Osor Tayeng, wife of state education secretary Bidol Tayeng, Cinthina Moyong (Osor’s elder sister), Maksup Yomso, Aido Moyong and Kadum Moyong on Wednesday.

Osor and Cinthina are sisters of sitting Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA from Pasighat East, Kaling Moyong. The MLA told HT on Thursday, “The law should take its course.”

East Siang superintendent of police Pranav Tayal said, “We got a complaint from a local youth organisation that the education secretary’s wife had confined two girls related to the family and was using them to practice black magic. Based on the complaint, a police team was sent to (Osor) Tayeng’s house in Pasighat and the two girls who are sisters — one of them a minor — were rescued. Police arrested five persons in the case.”

Osor and the other accused were allegedly using the girls to ward off evil spirits for the last two to three months. The matter came to public eye after a video of a woman hitting two girls spread across the social media recently.

According to the complaint, Osor and the other accused performed occult practices on the two sisters to get information about Cinthina’s former husband.

Police have sent the two rescued sisters to their homes and registered a case against the accused under Indian Penal Code sections related to wrongful confinement to extort confession, and assault to woman to outrage her modesty.

A court has remanded the five accused to police custody till April 28. The police are on the lookout for another accused, Lisa Apong, (daughter-in-law of former chief minister Gegong Apong), who is believed to be in Delhi.

Asked about his wife’s arrest, the state education secretary said, “There is an ongoing family dispute and the present case is an outcome of that.”

Incidentally, police also conducted a search at the IAS officer’s house in Itanagar on Wednesday following a complaint by the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) that three minors were illegally confined there and being used as child labour.

Though the police were not able to locate any minors kept illegally at the house, the CWC filed a case and urged the police to find the three children.

“There was information that (IAS officer) Tayeng’s family had confined three minors who were being used as child labour,” CWC chairperson Kani Nada Maling told HT.