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The Hindu, March 2009 Seeing a woman getting kidnapped in front of one’s eyes and the public reaction to it brings home many truths. Why is it that we remain silent when it comes to more violent infringements of personal space that happens every day in the country? Are we defining the notion of personal freedom too narrowly and in a way that is convenient? The district court building happens to be barely five minutes walk from my parental home in Chandigarh. Outside this house of justice, I witnessed the kidnapping of a young woman who had come there seeking justice. The violence of the act — and how it was accepted by so many as natural, just and “for her own good” — revealed the ugliness of the City Beautiful. What I saw is very much on my mind as I think about the recent protests to defend women’s right to go to pubs. I wonder if all the pink chaddis the protestors sent to shame the hoodlums of the Hindu Right have anything meaningful to offer to that poor woman in Chandigarh.
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Even the courts can't stop 'honour killings'. The police often collude.
It's a tragedy that has been played out all too often in recent months. There was a terrible sense of deja vu when Balkar Singh, 30, and his 19-year-old bride, Ravinder Pal Kaur, were hunted down and shot in cold blood by the bride's father, brother and cousins in Punjab's Tarn Taran district on January 26. Ever since the couple got married on January 1, defying Ravinder's family, they feared for their lives, and had sought the high court's protection. But the court order directing the police to protect them was in vain—as it often is.
On a typical day at the Punjab & Haryana High Court in Chandigarh, 10 or 12 couples who have tied the knot without their parents' consent try to seek protection from their parents' wrath. Very often, goons hired by their parents waylay and abduct them before they can enter the court's sanctuary. |
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Daughter keeps alive memory of mother murdered for 'honour' |
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The Independent, 14 December 2008 Ten years ago Surjit Athwal kissed her seven-year-old daughter goodbye in their Middlesex home and told her that she'd be back soon. The 27-year-old customs officer left with her mother-in-law to attend a family wedding in India. Her children never saw her again. They were told their mother had abandoned them to live with another man. All her photographs and clothes were taken away; it was as if she had never existed. In 2007, after years of campaigning by her brother, Jagdeesh Singh, Surjit's husband and mother-in-law were convicted for conspiracy to murder and jailed for 27 and 20 years respectively. Surjit Athwal had been taken to India under false pretences where she had been drugged, strangled and thrown into a river in the name of family honour. Her crime: she wanted to divorce her abusive husband and start a new life with her children. |
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