What drove a US woman to chain herself to a tree in an Indian forest, half-starve herself to death… then blame it on a husband who doesn't exist? The questions still unanswered after extraordinary tale shocked the world

• e-mail

'The sound was coming from the forest on the side of the mountain. When I went there, I saw that one of her legs was tied to a tree. She was screaming like an animal.'

Pandurang Gawkar, a cow herder, was the first to find US ballet teacher Lalita Kayi after her disappearance, found deep in the forests of India on July 27.

Police found the 50-year-old with a mobile phone, a tablet and some £290 (about $370) in local currency on her person.

But she was emaciated, skin and bone from apparent starvation with wounds on her leg and suffering 'extreme psychosis'.

She initially told police she had been 'chained and left in the forest to die' by her husband without food or water. 

Claimed to have spent 40 days in the remote forest north of Goa, it seemed a miracle Lalita had been found by a shepherd chancing upon the location.

But the strangest revelation came on Tuesday, when police revealed that she had told them that, in fact, she had no husband and had tied herself to the tree.

Lalita initially told police she had been plied with drugs that locked her jaw in place

Police rescued her after a cow herder heard her cries coming from the dense forest

In a note, she said she had been injected for 'extreme psychosis' and hadn't eaten for 40 days

Little was initially known about 'Lalitha Kayi', who was found in a dense forest near Sonurli, a tiny village of around 1,500 people roughly 280 miles from Mumbai on July 27.

On her person, police found several documents offering fragments of clues towards identifying her.

Her passport shows she is a US citizens from Massachusetts. Other documents show she now lives in Tamil Nadu, on the southern tip of the subcontinent.

MailOnline understands Lalita is a recent graduate of Boston University who studied psychology before working as a dance professor, self-employed.

According to the police, Lalita was a ballet dancer and yoga practitioner in America before she moved to India some ten years ago.

They say she left her home to study yoga and meditation in Tamil Nadu.

But nothing more has been said about what prompted Lalita to move to the other side of the world.

Nor is it known how Lalita purports to have studied in Boston between 2018 and 2022 if she moved to India ten years ago.

Boston University, in her native Massachusetts, offers a range of online courses - and this would have been, at least in part, during the pandemic.

Tourists and businesses can apply for visas lasting five years to stay in India, although tourists are not able to extend their visit.

Business visas can be extended - but Lalita says she has been working as a teacher for fewer than two years, leaving more questions unanswered.

Then the story gets strange.

Initially, police reported that they understood Lalita had been tied to a tree with a band around her leg by her husband, named in some media reports as a man called Satish.

They said they had to chop the tree down and break the lock to free her from her binds. 

Lalita could not speak at first, so exhausted from malnourishment, and all they did know they learned from her scribblings on a notepad.

She only knew English and could not communicate with them in Hindi or Marathi.

'When we discovered her, she was seriously dehydrated,' said Amol Chavan, an inspector at Sawantwadi Police Station. 

'It appears that she was stuck there for a minimum of 48 hours. Although she was mute.'

Lalita told police through her notes that her husband had tied her to a tree and left her there without food for 40 days 'to die' after a row.

In her bag, police said they found 'a raincoat and foodstuff'. 

She also claimed that she had been given an 'injection for extreme psychosis' which locked her jaw and prevented her from drinking water, and that she had to be provided nutrition intravenously.

'I am a victim and survived. But he ran away from here,' she told police.

Lalita was found tied to a tree after a cow herder found her calling for help

Lalita was taken to a psychiatric hospital in India after she was found in the remote forest

She was found shackled to a tree and unable to speak, communicating only through notes

Police later reported that they had been unable to verify these claims and believed it unlikely that someone would survive without food or water for so long.

As a rule, human beings can last about three days without water and up to three weeks without food.

Police believe Lalita had been 'stuck' for at least two days.

During the first five days without food, a person may lose 1-2kg of body weight each day, largely due to dehydration and electrolyte imbalance.

This slows with time, but photos from the hospital show Lalita quite severely malnourished.

She was taken to a primary healthcare centre in Sindhudurg's Sawantwadi taluka at first, where doctors had to give her nutrition intravenously.

The woman is not in a position to give her statement,' police said at the time.

'The woman is weak as she has not eaten anything for a couple of days and also as the area experienced heavy rains. 

'We don't know for how long she was tied to that tree. She reportedly left her husband after a quarrel.' 

Soon enough they registered the case of attempted murder against 'Satish' and sent teams to her home to investigate.

They hoped the mobile phone and tablet computer they found on her person might also offer insight into how she ended up in such a dire state.

But then, the twist.

On August 6, police and Lalita's doctor told the BBC they now believed Lalita had shackled herself to the tree, following a confession.

Lalita is now receiving treatment in a psychiatric facility as investigators try to make sense of what happened.

But some ten days after she was found, police revealed she had backtracked on her original story, telling them that she was not even married.

Saurabh Agarwal, superintendent of police for Sindhudurg, told the broadcaster they believed she was probably suffering hallucinations when she gave her first statement.

It was not clear what she may have taken - or been given by police.

She had claimed she had been given drugs for extreme psychosis before admitting her husband was a fabrication.

Whether or not she had given herself drugs before she was found was not clear.

And whether she intended for cow herder Pandurang Gawkar to find her was not clear, stumbled upon only by chance in the middle of a dense forest.

How long might she have remained with just a bag of food, a coat and her ID had he not found her? 

A T-shirt hangs from a tree above Lalita at the spot she was found by police in late July

The woman was found with various documents, including a passport and mobile phone

Police revised their initial impression, telling reporters that she was distressed because her visa for India had expired and that she was running out of money.

It is not clear what visa she was travelling on, or exactly how long she had been in India, but two five-year visas would indeed be nearing or have recently passed expiration.

She claimed that her financial situation had caused a lot of stress, leading her to buy the chains and locks to tie herself up. 

In a passing remark, the International Business Times claims that she was previously 'involved in a similar incident in Tamil Nadu before moving to Goa' - although provides no further detail or evidence. 

But police have not yet explained how she managed to travel more than 500 miles from her registered address to a forest in the middle of nowhere without help or records.

Although police believe she might have reached the forest near the Maharashtra-Goa border by train, the International Business Times reports.

'The woman was traveling to Goa from Mumbai. Since there is a single track, the train halts a couple of times before entering Goa,' an officer told The Indian Express.

'That spot is close to this forest. We suspect she got off when the train halted.'

And nor have they been able to indicate why she may have tried to pin this on a husband they now say does not exist.

Police are also yet to say who they were investigating when they began a probe into the man named as 'Satish'.

But for now, she is improving. 

Dr Sanghamitra Phule, superintendent of the hospital she remains in, said they had made contact with her family in the US and that she was in touch with them.

Doctors say her condition is getting better, and that she is now able to eat, walk and exercise.

Some 30 people had already been questioned by July 30, with more expected to follow.

The US embassy declined to comment on the case, citing her right to privacy. 

It was not clear whether there would be charges brought against Lalita.