nick
April 19th, 2010, 11:57 AM
Police in India are investigating a suspected case of human sacrifice after the severed head and naked torso of a man were found at a temple to the goddess Kali in the state of West Bengal.
“The severed head was smeared with red vermilion,” said Rabindranath Mukherjee, the district police superintendent. “Flowers, mainly marigolds, and incense sticks were scattered beside the body.”
Kalyan Mukherjee, a local official, said: “This man has been sacrificed to propitiate the gods.”
Human sacrifice has long been outlawed in India but endures in grizzly secret ceremonies. Kali, the Hindu goddess of time and change, is often portrayed as insatiably bloodthirsty, wearing a necklace of bleached human skulls. Historically, her followers formed blood-cults, hoping to receive blessings of fertility, health and wealth in return for human lives.
Such beliefs persist, especially in underdeveloped, rural areas where people desperate to improve their circumstances turn to witchdoctors for advice. A three-year-old boy was allegedly murdered as a child sacrifice in the state of Uttar Pradesh by a tantric priest last week.
His body was recovered “with his throat slit and his forehead smeared with vermilion,” the Hindustan Times quoted the boy’s father, Jai Prakash Singh, as saying. “He has been killed by people engaged in black magic,” Mr Singh added. It was the second such murder of a child in two months in the same district.
Full story here (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article7101449.ece)
“The severed head was smeared with red vermilion,” said Rabindranath Mukherjee, the district police superintendent. “Flowers, mainly marigolds, and incense sticks were scattered beside the body.”
Kalyan Mukherjee, a local official, said: “This man has been sacrificed to propitiate the gods.”
Human sacrifice has long been outlawed in India but endures in grizzly secret ceremonies. Kali, the Hindu goddess of time and change, is often portrayed as insatiably bloodthirsty, wearing a necklace of bleached human skulls. Historically, her followers formed blood-cults, hoping to receive blessings of fertility, health and wealth in return for human lives.
Such beliefs persist, especially in underdeveloped, rural areas where people desperate to improve their circumstances turn to witchdoctors for advice. A three-year-old boy was allegedly murdered as a child sacrifice in the state of Uttar Pradesh by a tantric priest last week.
His body was recovered “with his throat slit and his forehead smeared with vermilion,” the Hindustan Times quoted the boy’s father, Jai Prakash Singh, as saying. “He has been killed by people engaged in black magic,” Mr Singh added. It was the second such murder of a child in two months in the same district.
Full story here (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article7101449.ece)