Shillong, March 3 :     A couple suspected of witchcraft was burnt by a mob at Mawlai Nongkwar in Shillong last night. By the time the police arrived, the mob had already set the 55-year-old man and his wife afire. Their five-room concrete building was ransacked and then set ablaze. The superintendent of police, East Khasi Hills, said the mob started to ransack Soben Kurbah and Phropsimai Rynthathiang?s house at 9 pm, suspecting them of having murdered a local boy for purposes of black magic, or thlen. The boy was missing since February 26 and his body surfaced near a stream yesterday in Mawlai area. ?We reached as soon as we received news of the arson, but it was too late to save the couple,? the SP said. However, the police were able to rescue the couple?s three children and their maid, all in their teens. The mob beat them up too, the police added, and the four, suffering from total shock, are recuperating in a city hospital. Kurbah ran a prosperous paint and accessories shop in Mawlai, family sources said. Relatives from their ancestral village of Nongthliew, about 45 km away, took away the bodies to perform the last rites. M. Mawlong, the couple?s son-in-law, said he witnessed yesterday?s massacre. However, the couple?s relatives are too scared to lodge an FIR, he added. He said tension prevailed in the area since the boy, Samson Lyngshing, disappeared. Local people suspected that he was sacrificed to fulfil witchcraft rites.