Paramakatoi woman was beaten and suffocated – PME

By Michael Jordan

The postmortem examination conducted on the body of 76-year-old Ramdai Balkaran on Friday found that she died from suffocation. Mrs. Balkaran also known as ‘Sister Jean’ was found bound and gagged in her home on Thursday morning.

Police have launched an intensive hunt for the killer(s) who reportedly gained entry to her home by removing louvre panes from a window at the back of the property. It is believed that they beat the elderly woman while demanding money and other valuables.

The woman’s son, Samuel Balkaran who is a businessman, said that his mother only had her pension at the time since the shop he operates in the community was closed.

He said the gruesome crime was discovered at around 06.00 hours on Thursday when a nephew went to his mother’s home to do some cleaning. After calling and getting no response, he reportedly went to a smaller house on the premises, in which the husband, Basil Balkaran, meditates and prays.

The two then returned to Mrs. Balkaran’s house and eventually gained entry through the front. It was then they discovered Mrs. Balkaran’s bound, gagged and battered body in her room.

She was reportedly bound with a jacket and a pair of socks.

Mrs. Balkaran and her husband, Basil Balkaran, are missionaries with the Wesleyan Church, and have been living and conducting humanitarian work at Paramakatoi, located in the Potaro/Siparuni area,  for some 50 years.

Speaking to Big Smith News Watch from the Lyken Funeral Parlour, Samuel said that he last saw his mother alive on Christmas Day, when he came out of the Region Eight community to transact business. He supplies school uniforms and items to the secondary school dormitories.

“On Thursday, I got a call that something was wrong with my mom,” he said.

He then contacted his father via his transmitting set. It was then that he was told that “they broke into her house, tied her and strangled her.”

Her home was ransacked. He then returned to Paramakatoi by plane where he saw several police ranks at his mother’s house.

The family had lived at Herstelling, East Bank Demerara, but moved to Paramakatoi in 1972.

No arrests have been made for the murder.