india

Updated: Oct 04, 2017 14:24 IST

MUZAFFARPUR: A day after Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar launched a campaign against dowry, a leader of his party — Janata Dal (United) — was charged with killing his daughter-in-law in Muzaffarpur district.

Police said an FIR was registered late on Tuesday evening against JD(U) organisational secretary Arun Kumar Kushwaha for allegedly killing his daughter-in-law Rina Kumari for dowry.

Kushwaha’s son and two other relatives had also been made accused in the FIR lodged with Karja police station in Muzaffarpur district, 71 km north of Patna.

Karja police station SHO Ram Balak Yadav said Kumari’s father Mahesh Bhagat, in the FIR registered two days after the incident, alleged that his daughter was killed by Kushwaha and his family members for dowry.

The station house officer (SHO) said the accused were absconding and raids were being conducted to nab them.

In his complaint, Bhagat, a resident of Belka village in neighbouring Vaishali district, said, “We had given cash, jewellery and other gift items at the time of my daughter’s marriage, but her in-laws were demanding a four-wheeler. When I expressed my inability, they started torturing my daughter to put pressure on me.”

“They had threatened me on many occasions of dire consequences if we failed to meet their demand. Finally, they killed my daughter on October 1. They neither informed me nor any of my relatives before performing her last rites. It is clear that they wanted to destroy the evidences,” Bhagat told HT over phone.

Kumari married Dipak Kumar of Kajra in 2015 and had an 11-month-old child, Bhagat said.

Kushwaha, however, refuted the charges. “My daughter-in-law was observing fast during Navratra. On October 1, she complained of stomach pain. We were taking her to a doctor in the town but she died on way. We later performed the last rites after informing her father,” Kushwaha said.

On Monday, while launching the anti-dowry campaign in Patna, the chief minister had said that Bihar ranked second in the country after neighbouring Uttar Pradesh when it came to cases related to the social evil.

Last year, 987 cases of dowry deaths were registered in Bihar, while cases of dowry-related atrocities were 4,852.

(With agency inputs)