Domestic violence leads to another death

A 15-year old girl who moved out of her mother’s home at Coldingen, East Coast Demerara to live with her 16-year old lover died yesterday at the Georgetown Public Hospital, 11 days after she was burnt under mysterious circumstances.
Dead is Amrita Singh, who succumbed at round midday to severe burns about her entire body.
Police and the teen’s family members believe that the teen was set alight by her lover who has reportedly gone into hiding.
The young man had told relatives two different stories of how Singh sustained the burns.  In one version he reportedly claimed that kerosene stove had flared up. On another occasion he said that the teen had set herself alight.

However, there is evidence that despite the age of the couple, Singh was a victim of domestic abuse, while living with the young man at his parents’ home at Lusignan, East Coast Demerara.
Police have detained the young man’s father and his grandmother as they try to get to the bottom of the story.
Amrita Singh, called ‘Bako’, the third of her mother’s six children left her home, unknowing to her family last September to live with the young man.
Her mother, Kamini Singh, told this newspaper that on the afternoon of September 8, last she came home and did not see the teen.
She did not immediately suspect anything amiss, since she assumed that the teen was in the outdoor bathroom.
She later became worried and after checking in the teen’s room and then the bathroom she became suspicious because Amrita was nowhere around.
At the time she had no idea that her daughter was involved in a relationship with the young man who was staying at a house nearby.
The family began searching the village and it was not until about 23:00 hours that night that they received a telephone call informing them that Amrita was on the East Bank of Demerara.
It was the young man’s mother who contacted them.
“I was so confused, I didn’t know what to do. I called a lot of big people and chat with them. They tell me that the girl and the boy go away together and there is nothing we could do,” Kamini Singh told this newspaper.
She subsequently visited the East Bank Demerara home where her daughter was staying and after being assured by the young man’s mother that her daughter will be taken care of, Kamini Singh left and went back home.
“She say she like the boy and the boy say he like she, so that finish,” she said.
But after one week the couple left the East Bank Demerara home and disappeared for a while.
Kamini said that she did not know where they were for a while until she got word that they were at Lusignan where the young man’s father lived.
She said that she had not seen her daughter on a regular basis after she left the home but would send one of her sisters to check on her.
Devina Singh, one of the dead teen’s sisters, told this newspaper that the first time she visited the Lusignan home where Amrita was staying she found her in good health but the next time she visited two months ago, neither the teen nor her lover was there.
The family claimed that neighbours in Lusignan had informed them that Amrita Singh was constantly beaten by her teenaged lover and at times was put out of the house at nights. This was despite the presence of adults in the house.    However she refused to go back home, preferring to stay with her teenaged reputed husband.
At one time she was rescued by another relative who took her to live with her but after one week, she returned to Lusignan and to further abuse.
On June 12, at around 15:00 hours, Kamini Singh received a call from a resident of Lusignan, who informed her that her daughter had suffered severe burns and had been taken to the hospital. Singh rushed down to the hospital but only to see her daughter after when she was finally taken from the emergency room to the ward.
The sight of her daughter was too much for the mother of six, who burst into tears.
Amrita Singh was badly burnt on hands and legs, as well as her chest and neck.
According to Singh, up to the time of her death, her daughter did not tell her how she got burned.
“All she tell me is dat the boy father de cuss she up. She ain’t tell we exactly what is it or nothing,” Kamini Singh stated.
She suspects that her daughter’s young lover was responsible for what had happened, since he told her conflicting stories.
“He tell we that she had wood in one hand and de other hand gat de kero throwing pon she skin and she light it. He say he out it. When I ask he wha he tell de doctor, he tell me that he tell de doctor that stove burn she,” Kamini Singh told this newspaper.
She said that she was told by hospital personnel that the burns her daughter suffered were not consistent with a stove flare-up.
It was also revealed that the young man also told police at the hospital that he was the burnt teen’s brother.
But soon news of the teen’s tragedy reached the ears of social workers, and they visited the hospital and interviewed her, two Mondays ago.
After learning that the social workers were interested in speaking with him, the young man stopped visited his injured lover and subsequently disappeared.

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Kamini Singh said that when she went to the hospital yesterday, her daughter only managed to stay alive for a few seconds of the visit before closing her eyes for good.