An American woman has been found chained to a tree, claiming that her husband left her there 40 days earlier.
Lalita Kayi, 50, was found looking emaciated in a dense forest in the Sindhudurg district of Maharashtra in India on Saturday after a shepherd heard her desperate cries for help, according to NDTV.
Kayi, who had been found chained up to a tree, was taken to Goa Medical College for specialized therapy, but ended up having to scrawl a note to medics as she was too weak to speak.
In the handwritten message, she told them: "Injection for extreme psychosis which caused severe locked jaw and inability to drink any water.
"Need intravenous food later - 40 days without food in the forest - husband tied me to a tree in a forest."
She added: "'You'll die in this forest'. I am a crime victim."
Authorities believe the woman, who was found tied up with a metal chain, suffers from mental health issues according to NDTV, and was found with medication on her person.
Police have also opened an investigation into possible attempted murder by her husband, who has not been identified.
Police superintendent Saurabh Agrawal told the outlet: "Police are also trying to verify if the woman’s claim that she was chained by her former husband was genuine. We are verifying every claim and information in the note written by her."
Kayi was found with an American passport and an expired visa which suggested that she had lived in India for 10 years according to the outlet, and it is not currently known which part of the US she is originally from.
Other documents suggested that she had been living with her husband in Tamil Nadu.
She has so far been unable to provide an official statement to authorities as she was too weak.
Amol Chavan, an inspector at Sawantwadi Police Station who was part of the group that located Kayi, explained: "When we discovered her, she was seriously dehydrated. It appears that she was stuck there for a minimum of 48 hours. Although she was mute."
According to Chavan, police had to cut down the tree and break the lock on the chain that was restraining Kayi, and they are working to discover how long she had been tied up.
Officials also revealed that the area she was located in had recently experienced a heavy bout of rain before she was found.
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