Saudi police say Indian maid lost arm due to fall, claim she was 'mentally disturbed'

After days of outrage in India over reports that a Saudi man chopped off an Indian maid's arm, the Saudi police have now concluded that the woman, who hailed from Tamil Nadu, lost her arm during a fall from the building as she was trying to escape. 

The police have also claimed that Kasturi Munirathinam, 50, who was working as a domestic help for the Saudi national, was mentally disturbed. 

The incident had led to anger in India over Kasturi's treatment at the hands of the employers, as her family claimed that Kasturi's employer chopped off her hand when she tried to complain about torture and low wages. 

Indian foreign affairs minister Sushma Swaraj had called the incident 'unacceptable' and vowed to take up the issue with Saudi Arabia.

However, the police in Riyadh seem to have taken a different version of the incident, claiming that she was trying to climb out of the window using a rope made of clothes and fell on an electricity generator that resulted in the severing of her arm.

"Riyadh's Al-Sahafa police had received information from a local hospital about admitting a domestic help in its emergency section, saying that the woman's arm was severed following a fall. The domestic help, who arrived in the Kingdom nearly two months ago, was suffering from mental disturbances and therefore tried to flee the sponsor's house," Col. Fawaz Al-Maimaan, spokesman of Riyadh police was quoted saying by the Saudi Gazette. 

The Saudi police said that eyewitnesses have also testified to this version and claimed that Kasturi's employer himself rushed her to the hospital. 

The version is starkly different from what the Indian woman's family members have said. 

"We are told that the incident happened on the night of September 29 after she complained about torture and non-payment of wages by her employer. He chopped off her hand when she tried to escape from the house through the balcony. Some neighbours and others took her to hospital," Kasturi's sister told The Indian Express. 

Kasturi, who hails from Velore in Tamil Nadu, is still recuperating at a hospital in the kingdom and has undergone surgeries.