- Tuesday, February 25, 2025
By: Shubham Ghosh
SNAKES are being used to murder people in the north-western Indian state of Rajasthan and the country’s Supreme Court has expressed concerns over the “disturbing new trend”.
Last week, the issue came to the fore in a trial which involves Krishna Kumar, one of the three defendants accused of murdering Subodh Devi in the state’s Jhunjhunu district in 2019.
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Aditya Chaudhary, the legal representative of Kumar, asked the top court whether it is possible for a murder accused to be present nowhere near the crime scene and with no murder weapon. The lawyer also asked whether anybody could be called guilty in such a case.
The court bench, featuring Chief Justice N V Ramana and justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli, said in response that it was possible if the “murder weapon” happened to be a snake. They were not convinced with Chaudhary’s argument that there was nothing to link Kumar with the killing of Subodh Devi.
The prosecution told the court that Alpana, the daughter-in-law of the deceased, was having an affair with another defendant. The court was told that the couple approached a snake charmer with their friend, Kumar, and bought the reptile for £1,000 and when Subodh Devi was asleep, left it in a bag near her bed. The snake bit her and she died. They allegedly planned to eliminate Subodh Devi since she came to know about the affair. Both husbands of Subodh Devi and Alpana stay far away from home due to professional reasons.
The death did not raise an alarm initially since deaths caused by snakebites are common in Rajasthan. The police were alarmed only after they found 124 calls between them on the day Subodh died.
“How would he [Kumar] be a part of the conspiracy when no one can predict whom the snake will bite?” Chaudhary questioned. But the court rejected the argument saying this is a new trend that people bring venomous snakes from snake-charmers and kill a person through the creature.
The court refused to grant bail to an accused, saying “It is very common in Rajasthan to use poisonous snakes for committing murders. You have used an innovative method to commit a heinous crime. You were allegedly part of the conspiracy and provided the murder weapon (snake) after procuring it from the snake charmer. You do not deserve to be released on bail at this stage.”
Last year, a man in the southern Indian state of Kerala was also convicted of killing his wife by bringing in a cobra. He tried it first with a viper but that failed, The Times reported.
India witnesses huge instances of snakebite cases in the world every year, causing several thousands of deaths.
According to one report of the World Health Organisation, India had an estimated 1.2 million snake bite deaths (averaging 58,000 every year) between 2000-2019.
