Pudukottai: A black magic practitioner was arrested for allegedly killing a four-year-old girl by slitting her throat with a blade as sacrifice to her deity at Kurumpatti village near Iluppur in Pudukottai district. 47-year-old Chinnapillai confessed to the crime and has been remanded to custody on Monday, Inspector P. Mangayarkarasi told Deccan Chronicle.
She said the alleged killer lived close to the house of the victim, Shalini, and on October 25, she had lured her to a deserted place about half km from their place of residence promising something to eat. It was a spooky spot that the villagers would usually keep away from out of for fear that a local deity, Chemmuni, lurked there looking for human blood.
The black magic practitioner had decided to offer the girl in sacrifice to Chemmuni hoping that would propitiate her deity and her failing black magic business would pick up, Inspector Mangayarkarasi said, adding that the woman told the police after arrest that her clientele had shrunk and a recent disaster had literally led to the villagers banishing her.
"It appeared that this woman had an assistant and together they would go into the burial ground to conduct their ritualistic worship of the spirits. On one such occasion some three months ago, the assistant witnessed something weird and suffered shock. He became bed-ridden and died. After that, the villagers told the woman she should not practice her black magic there anymore and Chinnapillai was forced to look for clients outside. She decided a human sacrifice to Chemmuni would set things right for her", Inspector Mangayarkarasi said, expressing anguish that even in this modern age, such gruesome voodoo practices exist.
Chinnapillai's two sons are married and live elsewhere. Her husband Singaram works in a tasmac liquor shop at Coimbatore. He rushed back on hearing about his wife's crime. Remanded under section 302 (murder) of the IPC, Chinnapillai has been lodged in the Trichy central women's prison.
