Uploaded June 2026 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago

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Jharkhand reports the highest number of ‘witch’ murders in India – crimes in which women are labelled witches and killed. Most of the victims belong to Adivasi and lower caste communities – for a reason.

In this episode of True Story, Scroll’s Executive Editor Supriya Sharma speaks to reporter Nolina Minj about the historical forces of Adivasi land dispossession and impoverishment that have created conditions in which ‘witch’ murders persist.

Anxieties over loss of Adivasi land also keep women deprived of inheritance rights and fuel conspiracies theories about Muslim men luring Adivasi women through ‘love jihad’ and ‘land jihad’ – claims that Minj debunks.

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