KARWAR: Police arrested a 32-year-old woman on Wednesday after a video of her beating her 12-year-old daughter went viral.The viral video showed Renuka, a native of Vijayapura district living in a rented house at Pinge Road at Kajubag here, thrashing her eldest daughter with a cane, stamping her and dragging her by her hair, across the floor, without heeding her piteous pleas.Renuka is also seen abusing and threatening her neighbours who came to the rescue of the girl, who was writhing in pain. The neighbours managed to snatch the cane from the woman’s hands and rescued the girl. The incident took place last Sunday. Someone in the crowd had videographed the horrific scene and uploaded it on social media.Taking cognizance of the video that went viral, officials of the women and child welfare department and police visited the house of the victim on Wednesday. Police arrested the woman on charges of cruelty.Renuka’s first husband had deserted her following which she got married again. However, she is estranged from her second husband too. She moved to the rented house on Pinge Road six months ago along with her three daughters. She often used to beat the girls for silly reasons, said police.On questioning, Renuka told the officials that the owner of the house was objecting to her daughters playing outside the house and was also making false accusations of theft against them. “Following this, I had told my daughters not to play outside the house. Despite my repeated warnings, my eldest daughter went out to play on Sunday. This angered me and I hit her with a stick. I did not treat her inhumanly.”Police arrested her after receiving statements from the victim and neighbours. Gopalakrishna Bekal, deputy director of women and child welfare committee , said after completion of the legal procedure, the panel will get the child’s custody.

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