Youth brutally assaults septuagenarian mother for 'refusing old-age pension money' in Odisha's Ganjam

In a shocking incident, a youth brutally assaulted his septuagenarian mother and left her critically injured in Aska area of Ganjam on Sunday after she refused to pay her old-age pension money to him. The injured Debaki Rout, aged over 70, of Padhal village, was admitted to a hospital. One of her hands was broken in the attack.

It was alleged that her younger son Pramod Rout used to ask for her old-age pension money and he attacked her when she refused the money on Sunday. 

Following the attack on her, Debaki cursed her fate and lamented that the son whom she gave birth after carrying him in her womb for 10 months and 10 days attacked her and broke her hand for mere pension money.

“My younger son beat me mercilessly with a stick. I brought him up and he grew up, but when I was supposed to be taken care of at twilight, my son beat me,” Debanki bemoaned at Aska hospital.

However, Pramod explained that he had not beaten his mother. “When my mother was beating my father, I dragged her away. I do not know how much pension money she gets. This is a conspiracy against him by his sisters,” he added.

This is not the lone case. The list of such cases is long. In December 2023, a youth had beaten his mother on the village street after accusing of her stealing cabbage from the farmland. The accused son identified as Satrughna Mohanta also tied her to a utility pole. The incident was reported from Champua.  

Social activist Namrata Chaddha said, “Such incidents show that sense of humanity and social values are declining. The age-old values of taking care of our elderly parents and elderly persons in the families have gone.  Moreover, nobody fears for police action. I wonder how the people’s representatives, local people are keeping a mum on such incidents.”