KLUANG (THE STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK) - A mother of three, hands and feet chopped off by her deranged husband, is fighting for her life in the intensive care unit.
After he committed the barbaric act, the unemployed man drank poison and hanged himself.
Jealousy is believed to be the main reason for the brutal assault.
A neighbour, who declined to be identified, claimed that the victim K. Menaga, 44, had been working as a dishwasher at a hotel in Singapore and had stayed in the Republic for the past 15 years.
The neighbour said the victim was the family's sole breadwinner as her 47-year-old husband was jobless.
"She only comes back once a month to see their three children and her mother-in-law, who has been taking care of their children, and also to give money to them.
"Every time she came back, they quarrelled because the husband accused her of having an affair with a man who sometimes sent her home from Singapore," the neighbour said.
The victim's brother K. Ravichantaran, 47, said her sister was currently unconscious in the intensive care unit of the Enche' Besar Hajjah Khalsom Hospital.
He said the couple's children are between 10 and 19 years old.
The eldest daughter, he said, was working while waiting to further her tertiary education.
"They are now being taken care of by one of our relatives, who is also living in Kluang. We have so many things to think of, including my sister's condition and taking care of her children," said Ravichantaran.
During the incident, Menaga's two older children were out working while the youngest was staying with his father and grandmother at their double-storey house along Jalan Kedondong 4 in Taman Suria.
Menaga returned home at around 11am on Thursday when she was confronted by her husband, who accused her of having an affair with another man in Singapore.
This led to a heated argument, resulting in her husband attacking her with a meat cleaver and chopping off her wrists and feet.
Her husband then ran to the second floor and locked the door. He drank poison before hanging himself at the balcony of the house.
Kluang police said initial investigations showed that jealousy was the cause behind the attack.
