Odisha Sun Times Bureau
Dharamgarh, Dec 24:

The Kalahandi Additional District Sessions Court today awarded life imprisonment to eight persons for chopping hands of two migrant labourers in Odisha's Kalahandi district in 2013.

hand-chopping

The court also imposed a fine of Rs 20,000 on each of them.

Speaking to reporters after the verdict came out, Dialu Nial expressed his happiness. “I am pleased over the judgement even though it took two long years,” he said.

The palms of two migrant labourers – Nilambar Dhangda Majhi and Piyalu Dhangda Majhi – from Nuaguda village under Jaipatna Police Station of Kalahandi district were chopped off by a labour contractor and his henchmen on December 16, 2013 after the duo expressed their inability to pay back the advance money received by them while being forcibly taken to Chhattisgarh to work at a construction site there.

The labour contractor from Sinapali area of Nuapada district was taking these two victims, along with ten other people, to Chhattisgarh for working in brick kilns.

The labourers had taken an advance of Rs 10,000 to Rs 15,000 each from the labour contractor with a promise that they will go to the construction site after harvesting their paddy crop.

But before completion of the harvest work, the labour contractor reached the village and forcibly took away 12 people from the village in a Bolero jeep.

On the way, 10 out of the 12 labourers managed to flee from the clutches of the contractor but Nilambar and Piyalu could not. Angry at the escape of the other labourers, the middleman chopped off the right hands of both Nilambar and Piyalu.