A 36-year-old construction worker was arrested on Tuesday for murdering his wife for spending too much time on Facebook chatting with male friends in defiance of his warnings Tamil Nadu's Tirunelveli district. The accused identified as Gomathinayagam has three children and confessed to having murdered his wife, Muthumari (33), six days ago on repeated questioning by the police.

He has been remanded in 15 days custody by Sankarankoil judicial magistrate, Vijayalakshmi. A police officer from Sankarankovil stated the accused had filed a complaint last Thursday stating that his wife was found dead in their house with deep cuts on her body.

"During questioning, he said Muthumari was active on Facebook and was always engaged in chatting with male friends, and any one of the friends could have committed the murder for gain," stated an officer.

According to the sources, the police, however, suspected something amiss in his version of events because neither cash nor jewellery was taken from his house. A forensic team was sent to the house on Monday with a sniffer dog for the investigation. "The dog ran for about 100 metres but came back to the house. The fingerprints collected at the place of crime also matched with those of Gomathinayagam," he added.