New Delhi, March 14, 2016: Honor killing, the bane of India, raised its head again.
A 22-year-old Dalit man was allegedly killed by three men who came on a motorcycle in Tamil Nadu.
A CCTV camera captured some parts of the assault as it happened at a crowded bus stand in Udumalaipettai town of Tirupur district.
Sankar who belonged to the Pallars, at times known as the Devendra Kula Vellalars, was in the third year of engineering when he married Gowsalya, 19, belonging to the upper-caste Thevar community. .
The relatives of the boy allege that the girl’s parents never approved of the union.
A video footage shared by the News Minute shows the attackers dragging and beating Sankar with some sort of objects. His wife Gowsalya too has been attacked and is recovering from multiple injuries but is out of danger.
A report by DNAIndia states that the wife of the deceased has also told the police that her family was behind her husband’s murder. Sankar and Gowsalya married 8-months back after the two fell in love while studying in an engineering college in Palani.
Meanwhile, the father-in-law of Sankar has surrendered while the political blame-game has begun on this alleged honor killing with the DMK accusing the state government and the police for overlooking many such incidents that have took place recently.
This murder is one of the many honor killings that take place in the country.
Earlier too, an honor killing case from Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh had come to light. A young girl Phool Jahan’s brothers, Gul Hasan and Nanhe were unable to digest her affair with their cousin, and to avenge their ‘honor’ they beheaded the 17-year old and even marched with her head at the Bamani Chowki village, in Shahjhanapur. This incident that took place in 2015 shook the country but despite all the outrage the government has been unable to put an end to this practice of honor killing.
Even Kolkata, where these things have been unheard of till the December of 2012, saw a case of honor killing in which a garment trader, Mehtab Alam, beheaded his 24-year old sister and a mother of two young children.
He beheaded her with a sword and then took the severed head to the police station where he surrendered.
Many such incidents have come to light from different parts of the country and religion and castes have been blamed in many cases as well.
But many commentators fail to highlight that it is neither the inter-religion marriage nor the inter-caste unions, which is the problem, sometimes young boys and girls are killed solely for satisfying the ego of relatives or established norms.
Many blame the state for not punishing the culprits in the cases of honor killing either, but in most such cases the perpetrators are shielded by the society or a clan at large and it is these groups that try all tricks to stop the wheels of justice.
So what can be done?
Actually, all we can do is educate our society and stop blaming the state and politicians for all the wrongs that its citizens commit.
Many of our politicians including the famous Abdullahs of India have married outside their religion and none of their children were ever harmed.
Sara Abdullah, daughter of Indian politician Farooq Abdullah, is married to Sachin Pilot while his son Omar Abdullah was married to Payal Nath. Bhartiya Janata Party’s Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Shahnawaz Hussain also have Hindu wives and there are an equal number of high-profile inter-caste marriages as well. In short, at least in this regard, it isn’t the politicians who can be blamed; they are way ahead in giving their children the right of choice in marriage.
The society needs to think deeper and take steps so that our youngsters do not suffer our idiosyncrasies and put an end to honor killing. There is simply no honor in it.
Click here to watch the video.
Pic credit: HumanityHealing.com
