THE INDIA HANGING THAT GOES ON AND ON....

Teen trips to noose death

Calcutta, Nov. 27: Dhananjoy Chatterjee’s hanging (India's first in years) continues to haunt the people of the state more than two months after his execution at Alipore central jail with a 14-year-old dying last night while enacting the incident.

Sunderlal Mondal was showing his brother and sister how the execution took place when the noose tightened around his neck. The siblings thought his struggles were part of the act and applauded as the noose strangled Sunderlal.

Realisation dawned when the boy’s father, Palan Mondal, arrived at the scene. The 14-year-old was rushed to hospital from their home in Khas Kumrakhali in the Basanti police station area, 65 km from Calcutta, but died.

Around 10.35 pm, after dinner, Sunderlal had told his younger siblings that he would enact the hanging. The children watched in rapt attention as the Class VII student of Kumrakhali Higher Secondary School picked up his mother’s saree. He tied one end to a ceiling beam and wrapped the other around his neck before standing on a small stool.

Suddenly, the teenager tripped and the saree tightened around his neck.

Official records show that this is the fifth such incident in the last three months.