The tea plantation worker and his four children had been blamed for causing a disease which killed two other workers and made many unwell in Assam state.
About 200 villagers tried and sentenced the family in an unofficial court, then publicly beheaded them with machetes.
They then marched to a police station with the heads, chanting slogans denouncing witchcraft and black magic.
March 19, 2006
Family of 5 beheaded for witchcraft.
In the Sonitpur district of India:
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6 comments:
spambot alert...
Gaius: That was one of the cleverer spambots though.
I noticed in the original article that the head of the executed family is a "traditional healer." That is one way to describe a good part of what witches (insofar as they actually exist) do.
Nietzsche says somewhere that in the witchcraft trials of the Christian Middle Ages the accusers and the accused had something in common: the accusers thought that the accused were witches, and the accused also thought that they were witches -- and yet, there were no witches!
I think of witchcraft trials as a sort of test case for cultural relativism. So, you think everything is relative, do you? Well, relativize this!
They are getting rather too clever, aren't they?
Hopefully, having moderated comments in Word Press will help me on that. Maybe.
Actually, Ann, the spambots hit my Blogger site, too. It appears that Blogger has lost control.
I bit the bullet and got my own URL and a hosting service. Frankly the "free" service from Blogger isn't worth the cost......
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