Murders India

Lakshmi already had one daughter, so when she gave birth to a second girl, she killed her. For the three days of her second child's short life, Lakshmi admits, she refused to nurse her. To silence the infant's famished cries, the impoverished village woman squeezed the milky sap from an oleander shrub, mixed it with castor oil and forced the poisonous potion down the newborn's throat. The baby bled from the nose and died soon afterward.

Twelve people, including a schoolgirl and six Indian paramilitary soldiers, were killed in separate incidents of violence in the troubled Kashmir region, police said Saturday. The girl, part of a school group on the way to a picnic at the scenic resort of Pahalgam, was killed in an explosion when the bus in which she was riding ran over a land mine.

Black-garbed gunmen stormed a village while its residents slept early Saturday, executing 34 women, children and elderly men in the latest caste-related violence in one of India's most impoverished states. The attackers, identified as members of an upper-caste militia backed by rich landlords, fought a gun battle with several armed villagers for 2 1/2 hours until the residents ran out of ammunition, said M.V.

The life of Phoolan Devi, "the Bandit Queen," was a losing battle against bad men, and even now that she is dead, two of them are fighting to take all she had. Three masked gunmen killed Devi, 37, last month at the gate of her official residence, a decaying bungalow with a high-class address. It was a modest perk for a member of Parliament who had made her name as a gangster demanding respect for the poor and the weak.

A 5-year-old boy accused of clubbing three children to death has been abandoned by his family, who feared reprisals from the victims' relatives. Authorities, unable to prosecute the boy under Indian law because he is under 6, are unsure how to handle the case. "This is the first case of its kind; we are at a loss what to do," said Ratan Lal Kanojia, a deputy inspector general of police in the eastern state of Bihar. Kanojia said the boy attacked the children with a bamboo club Dec.

Dalip Singh could not plant his winter rice crop this year. At 70, the old Sikh farmer has long since lost his strength. He's little more than a living skeleton now, his frail bones cracking beneath a shell of weathered skin and his shattered spirit now vanished along with his sons. In the past, Dalip Singh's boys helped him plant the rice each year at this time. But this winter, they're gone, victims of a war almost without equal in a world struggling toward new visions of peace.

Sikh rebels shot to death 25 Hindu farm workers on the eve of the anniversary of the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by Sikh bodyguards, police said Saturday.

Armed Sikh separatists stormed one of the country's most prestigious engineering colleges before dawn Friday, killing 19 students asleep in a dormitory, police said. The militants, armed with Chinese-made AK-47 rifles, entered Thapar Engineering College and knocked on the door of the dormitory, said a police spokesman. When one of the students opened the door, the gunmen opened fire, he said.

Unidentified assailants armed with bows and arrows killed a Christian missionary in the east Indian state of Orissa, the Press Trust of India said. Arun Das, a Roman Catholic priest in remote Anandpur village in Orissa state, was attacked Wednesday night while camping in a village where 15 Christian families live, the news agency said. The area is 750 miles southeast of New Delhi.

Authorities suspended an annual Hindu pilgrimage in the Himalayas after Islamic militants attacked devotees with hand grenades, killing 14 people in the disputed province of Jammu and Kashmir on Saturday, police said. Seven pilgrims, two police officers guarding the route, four porters and one militant dressed as a Hindu priest were killed, said a police officer speaking on condition of anonymity.

A college student arrested in the slaying of India's famed "Bandit Queen" says he killed her in retribution for her gang's alleged massacre of 22 high-caste men in 1981, police said. Phoolan Devi--an outlaw-turned-politician idolized by the poor--was shot to death Wednesday outside her New Delhi home. Devi allegedly carried out the 22 killings in revenge for her gang rape. Sher Singh Rana, 22, was arrested in Uttaranchal state in Devi's slaying.

Phoolan Devi, the "Bandit Queen" whose fight to avenge discrimination made her a heroine to millions of India's poor, was shot dead as she came home from her seat in Parliament for lunch Wednesday. Three masked gunmen opened fire on Devi, who claimed to be 37, when she got out of her car at her official residence shortly after 1:30 p.m., police said.

Authorities suspended an annual Hindu pilgrimage in the Himalayas after Islamic militants attacked devotees with hand grenades, killing 14 people in the disputed province of Jammu and Kashmir on Saturday, police said. Seven pilgrims, two police officers guarding the route, four porters and one militant dressed as a Hindu priest were killed, said a police officer speaking on condition of anonymity.

Workers at a jute mill in Calcutta beat to death a senior manager and the chief executive who apparently shot and killed an employee in a labor dispute, police said. J.P. Tiwari, the chief executive officer, allegedly fired a revolver after workers calling for two suspended colleagues to be reinstated surrounded him, police said. After the shooting, workers beat Tiwari and a general manager to death, police said. Twenty-seven people were taken into custody.

A 13-year-old boy has been convicted in the mob killing of an Australian missionary and his two sons. The teenager was sentenced to 14 years in prison. Graham Staines, 58, and his sons, Philip, 10, and Timothy, 8, were burned alive inside the vehicle where they were sleeping after a Bible study meeting in the village of Manoharpur in January 1999. Hindu radicals accuse missionaries of illicitly inducing conversions to Christianity.

Black-garbed gunmen stormed a village while its residents slept early Saturday, executing 34 women, children and elderly men in the latest caste-related violence in one of India's most impoverished states. The attackers, identified as members of an upper-caste militia backed by rich landlords, fought a gun battle with several armed villagers for 2 1/2 hours until the residents ran out of ammunition, said M.V.

Workers at a jute mill in Calcutta beat to death a senior manager and the chief executive who apparently shot and killed an employee in a labor dispute, police said. J.P. Tiwari, the chief executive officer, allegedly fired a revolver after workers calling for two suspended colleagues to be reinstated surrounded him, police said. After the shooting, workers beat Tiwari and a general manager to death, police said. Twenty-seven people were taken into custody.

A 13-year-old boy has been convicted in the mob killing of an Australian missionary and his two sons. The teenager was sentenced to 14 years in prison. Graham Staines, 58, and his sons, Philip, 10, and Timothy, 8, were burned alive inside the vehicle where they were sleeping after a Bible study meeting in the village of Manoharpur in January 1999. Hindu radicals accuse missionaries of illicitly inducing conversions to Christianity.

A Roman Catholic priest was found beaten to death in his home in Mathura, India, Christian groups and police said. The All India Catholic Union said attackers entered the home of Father George Kuzhikandan on Tuesday night and killed the 43-year-old Indian priest. A former student of Kuzhikandan's who had been staying in his house was found locked in his room, said John Dayal, spokesman for the All India Catholic Union, a private Christian group.

A minister in the strife-torn Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir and four other people were killed Monday when a bomb planted by guerrillas blew up the official's car, police said. It was the first killing of a government minister in Kashmir since an armed revolt broke out in the Himalayan region in 1990.