A man has been sentenced to death in India after he burned his wife alive because her skin was too dark.
Kishandas , from the northwestern village of Navaniya, ‘routinely’ taunted his wife Lakshmi ‘for being dark skinned’ before her murder on June 24, 2017, a court in Udaipur heard.
The judgement has made headlines in a country where colourism and a caste system remain deeply entrenched in society.
District Judge Rahul Choudhary in the northern city of Udaipur said the decision to sentence Kishanda to death was because the murder fell in the category of the ‘rarest of the rare’ and it was ‘a crime against humanity’.
Before her death, Lakshmi had given statements to the police and medical staff, in which she said her husband often called her ‘kali’ or dark skinned and would body shame her, the BBC reports.
On the night she was killed, Kishandas had reportedly brought a plastic bottle filled with a brown liquid and told her it was a medicine that would make her skin lighter.
According to the statements, he applied the liquid onto her body before setting her on fire with an incense stick.
Lakshmi was rushed to the hospital by Kishandas’ family, where she later died from her injuries.
Lakshmi (pictured) was set on fire and killed in 2017 by her husband for being too dark. A court in India has now sentenced him to death over her murder
In his ruling, the judge added: ‘It’s a crime that shocks the conscience of humanity which cannot even be imagined in a healthy and civilised society’.
Public prosecutor Dinesh Paliwal hailed the order as ‘historic’ and said he hoped it would act as a ‘lesson for others in society’.
The court order has been forwarded to the high court for confirmation of the death sentence, but Kishands has 30 days to appeal.
His lawyer Surendra Kumar Menariya said his client is innocent and that Lakshmi’s death was accidental.
He added that there was no evidence against his client who had been falsely charged ad that Kishandas would appeal.
Colourism remains a major issue in India, with activists linking the bias to an entrenched caste system, where higher-caste Brahmins generally have lighter skin.
Bullying and taunting of dark-skinned girls and women is common, and skin lightening products are heavily advertised.
India’s problem of violence against women and girls is also well documented, with the BMJ reporting that one in three women in the country are likely to have been subjected to violence at the hands of an ‘intimate partner’.
Last year, a woman who was six months pregnant with twins was allegedly burned alive by her husband in a murder case that shocked India.
Police said that the 23-year-old woman, named only as Pinky, was killed by her husband, Sukhdev, after getting into an argument in their home in Buled Nangal village in the Rayya area of Amritsar, near the border with Pakistan in April 2024.
Sukhdev allegedly assaulted her, tied her to a bed in the front garden of their home and set her alight, police said.
Pinky tragically died on the spot, while the alleged killer fled before being hunted down, arrested and charged with her murder.
Police said the couple had a strained relationship, and would often argue over a range of issues.
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