Rameswaram: Spurned stalker stabs to death Class 12 girl on way to school
The accused Muniyaraj, a resident of the same area, had allegedly been stalking the girl for days and pressuring her to accept his proposal, despite repeated rejections
Muniyaraj
RAMESWARAM: She turned down his romantic proposals multiple times. But 21-year-old Muniyaraj wouldn’t take no for an answer. When her father warned him against harassing his daughter, Muniyaraj chose revenge. He stabbed her to death when she was on her way to school, on a public road in broad daylight.
According to police, the incident happened on Wednesday in Rameswaram. The girl lived with her family in Cherankottai near the island town. The accused Muniyaraj, a resident of the same area, had allegedly been stalking the girl for days and pressuring her to accept his proposal, despite repeated rejections. The girl’s father Mariyappan, a fisherman, had recently confronted the youth and warned him against harassing his daughter.
Enraged by her rejections and the warning from her family, the man allegedly decided to attack her when she was heading to school on Wednesday morning, officers said.
The accused confronted the girl on a public road and stabbed her multiple times with a knife, causing her grievous injuries, police said.
The teenager succumbed to her injuries before any medical help could reach, a preliminary inquiry has revealed. Passersby who witnessed the attack alerted police, following which personnel from the Port police station rushed to the scene and recovered the body, officials said.
The accused, who had fled the spot after the assault, was nabbed by a special police team, officers said. He has been charged under appropriate sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
The ruling DMK government came under severe criticism from political opponents in the State. While the AIADMK demanded that the accused be awarded with the maximum punishment for the crime, Pattali Makkal Katchi leader Anbumani Ramadoss alleged that only ‘antisocial elements’ were safe under the DMK regime in the State.
“Who is responsible for a situation where even a girl student going to school in the morning is not safe? Where did the accused get the audacity to murder a schoolgirl in broad daylight?” AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami asked.