BJP MLA’s sister among 5 held for ‘using children’ for black magic

A BJP MLA’s sister who is married to an IAS officer, her elder sister and three others have been arrested by Arunachal Pradesh police on charges of illegally confining children to allegedly perform black magic.

The East Siang district police arrested Osor Tayeng, wife of state education secretary Bidol Tayeng, Cinthina Moyong (Osor’s elder sister), Maksup Yomso, Aido Moyong and Kadum Moyong on Wednesday.

Osor and Cinthina are sisters of sitting Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA from Pasighat East, Kaling Moyong. The MLA told HT on Thursday, “The law should take its course.”

East Siang superintendent of police Pranav Tayal said, “We got a complaint from a local youth organisation that the education secretary’s wife had confined two girls related to the family and was using them to practice black magic. Based on the complaint, a police team was sent to (Osor) Tayeng’s house in Pasighat and the two girls who are sisters — one of them a minor — were rescued. Police arrested five persons in the case.”

Osor and the other accused were allegedly using the girls to ward off evil spirits for the last two to three months. The matter came to public eye after a video of a woman hitting two girls spread across the social media recently.

According to the complaint, Osor and the other accused performed occult practices on the two sisters to get information about Cinthina’s former husband.

Police have sent the two rescued sisters to their homes and registered a case against the accused under Indian Penal Code sections related to wrongful confinement to extort confession, and assault to woman to outrage her modesty.