Woman found hanging two days after husband chained, assaulted her
Police arrested Mukta’s husband after her brother filed a case over her death; a video of her being chained and beaten was later found on his phone.
A 25-year-old woman was found hanging at her home in Dhaka's Khilkhet two days after her husband allegedly chained her to a bed and beat her, with police later recovering a video of the assault from his phone.
Police recovered Mukta Islam Mawa's body from a flat on Road 5 in Khilkhet on 3 September and arrested her husband, Md Sohel Sikder, 31.
Mukta's family has alleged that Sohel beat her to death and then hung her from a ceiling fan to make it appear to be a suicide.
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According to police and the family, Sohel assaulted Mukta on 1 September, recorded the incident and sent the video to her younger brother, Tanvir Rahman, with a message saying, "Take your sister away."
Police later recovered the video from Sohel's mobile phone. It shows Mukta's legs chained to a bed while Sohel beats her with a leather belt and threatens to kill her. Mukta is heard telling him that she had done nothing wrong.
Their two children, five-and-a-half-year-old Safwan and four-and-a-half-year-old Tasfia, were crying in the next room during the assault. Hearing them, Mukta reportedly asked her husband to let her put the children to sleep before he continued beating her.
Tanvir later filed a case against Sohel and three others – Sohel's nephew Alif Hossain, 22, sister Kajal Begum, 45, and brother-in-law Md Bashar, 55 – alleging that Mukta was regularly assaulted over false allegations of an extramarital affair.
Khilkhet police Sub-Inspector Rajib Bhowmik, the investigation officer, said the assault video had been recovered from Sohel's phone.
"It will be known after receiving the autopsy report whether she died from the assault or by suicide," he told The Business Standard.
Sohel, however, claimed that he returned home after going to the market and found Mukta hanging from the ceiling with a scarf. He admitted to beating her, the investigation officer said.
