A 29-year-old woman from Assam was arrested on charges of murdering her relative’s son, a seven-year-old boy in Tamil Nadu’s Coimbatore district.

The incident took place at Sulur area in the district.

The accused has been identified as Nurja Khatun, who was working in a cotton textile mill in Kalangal near Sulur.

The deceased was identified as Khairul Islam, son of Zaheer Hussain, a resident of Bilasipara in Assam’s Dhubri district.

As per sources, Khatun’s relative, Zaheer Hussain, his wife, and their minor son came to Kalangal around two months ago.

The two families, along with other workers of the mill, lived in the same quarters provided by the management at Kalangal.

Meanwhile, Khatun and Hussain’s wife had a quarrel at the workplace 10 days ago, following which the mill owner transferred Khatun to another mill, sources added.

However, the woman was annoyed over the change of workplace.

On Tuesday, the boy’s mother visited the quarters to give him food, and went back to work. When Zaheer came to the quarters around 2pm, he found his son strangled to death with a cloth.

He informed the mill supervisor, who alerted the Sulur police.

The Sulur police sent the body to the ESI Medical College Hospital at Singanallur for a postmortem.

Preliminary inquiry revealed that there was a dispute between Zaheer Hussain and his neighbour 10 days ago over their children playing at the quarters.

The Sulur police launched an investigation and arrested Khatun on Wednesday. She will be produced before a court for judicial remand.