The woman who was arrested for allegedly killing her 8-year-old son revealed that she committed the crime in a fit of rage when he returned home from school in dirtied clothes and two of his books were missing, police said on Thursday.

The accused, Poonam Devi, was arrested on Tuesday and was produced in court on Thursday. The court sent her to judicial custody, they said.

The police had earlier suspected that the woman killed her son after he came to know of her alleged illicit relationship with a man.

"During the police interrogation, Devi revealed that on Monday, when her 8-year-old son Karthik returned from school, his clothes were smeared with wall putty and he had also lost two books. In a fit of rage, she first removed his clothes and made him stand outside their house," Assistant Commissioner of Police Varun Dahiya said. "When he insisted on going to some shop, she strangled him with her ‘chunni',” ACP Dahiya said.

The matter came to light on Monday when the police received a call from a private hospital regarding the death of a child, police said.

The victim's father, Arvind Kumar, who works as a labourer, spotted injury marks on the neck of his and claimed that he was murdered. Following this, he filed a complaint at the Sector 18 police station, police said.

In his complaint, he said that a neighbour informed him that his son had fallen ill. When he reached home, he found his saw lying unconscious and his wife was crying next to him. They rushed him to a hospital where the doctors declared him brought dead, they said.

During the investigation, the police identified the victim's mother, Devi as a suspect and arrested her. She later confessed to the crime and was in police remand for a day, they said.

The family hails from Lakhimpur Kheri in Uttar Pradesh, they added.

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