‘Which woman can bear the sight of a beheaded husband?’

By Our Staff Reporter
IMPHAL, Jun 12: “Which woman can bear the sight of her beheaded and mutilated husband?, asked  27 year old Winiliu Thiumai.
Narrating her heart-breaking account, Winiliu Thiumai recalled that she and her husband were abducted by the women of Leilon Vaiphei village on their way home from Khurkhul.
Winiliu said that she and her husband Dilip Thiumai took their youngest daughter to the Khurkhul PHC in the morning of May 13, 2026 as the child was suffering from dysentery.
As they came back after treatment at around 11 am, they were intercepted by a group of Leilon Vaiphei women.
Apart from the couple and their child, 15 other Naga people were abducted from Leilon Vaiphei village the same day.
At the time, they were apprehended by the women of Leilon Vaiphei, CRPF personnel were also present, but they reportedly stood by as mere spectators without bothering to intervene.
After capturing them, the women kept them in a community hall. After being held there for a short while, they were moved again to a school.
At the school, a woman from Leilon Vaiphei approached them holding a mobile phone.
She showed them photographs of dead bodies from an ambush that had taken place that day.
She said that they were being captured for the fatal ambush.
Not long after the woman left, several men wearing full KNF(P) uniforms and carrying sophisticated weapons arrived.
Out of the group, three men stepped forward, separated the six men who were among the abductees, and dragged them away to different locations.
"After being forcibly separated from my husband, my mind went through agonizing pain, wondering what they would do to my husband," she shared.
Winiliu Thiumai narrated that they blindfolded her tightly with a cloth, made her climb steep hill, and brought her to a gorge. There, they kept her blindfolded through the night and gave her food.
After keeping her in that distressed state for a long time, the women of Leilon Vaiphei brought her and other abductees to Molnoi village in the early morning of May 15 and handed them over to the police.
When those women released her, she did not see any of the men. Consequently, her anxiety and worry for her husband grew much deeper.
"For almost one month, the Government and security forces could not establish the whereabouts of my husband and other male hostages. But suddenly on June 10, it was said that all the male hostages including my husband had been found dead with their bodies hacked into pieces”, she said in a voice choked with emotion and despair.
She asked why those responsible for executing such a brutal and horrific murder have not been arrested to this day.
"If the security forces had made timely efforts to rescue them, my husband might still be alive today. Even if a person must be punished, torturing them to death so brutally and mercilessly is something that should never happen in this world."
She added that her husband, Dilip, used to work as a runner at the Leimakhong Army Camp to earn a livelihood.
She, her deceased husband, and their three young children were living together peacefully as a family at Konsakhul before this tragedy occurred.