A fortnight after the landmark judgement by a court in Karnal that sentenced five people to death, one to life imprisonment and another to seven years in jail for the murder of a young couple who had married against the wishes of their community elders, representatives of khap panchayats, under the aegis of a maha khap meeting, have resolved to defend those convicted. In fact, they have decided to undertake a protest march to Parliament House to make their voices heard. It will be recalled that the case in question relates to the honour killing of one Manoj and Babli in 2007. The killing had been sanctioned by a khap panchayat on the ground that the two individuals belonged to the same gotra or sub-caste. Since, according to khap panchayats, marrying within the same gotra is an unpardonable sin, the two were condemned to death. But even though the Karnal court judgement has been hailed as an historic one — it is the first of its kind against honour killing authorised by a khap panchayat in Haryana — the self-styled caste leaders are in no mood to give up their traditional authority. They have vowed to collect money from people to provide legal aid to the convicts and have even threatened the Haryana Government with dire consequences if the latter does not support their cause. As if this weren't enough, the caste leaders have also been demanding that the Hindu Marriage Act be amended so that inter-gotra marriages are made illegal. They also want khap panchayats to be accorded the same status as Lok Adalats.
There is no debate about the fact that khap panchayats are a menace to society. What started off as a traditional group of community elders who would play an influential role in maintaining peace and stability in a particular village has today mutated into a deplorable collective of self-styled extra-judicial figures in rural north India. They comprise a backward-looking force that is the antithesis of a modern, liberal society. That khap panchayats should think it absolutely normal to subvert the law of the land and force their writ on the people is a serious cause for concern. The punishment for not following the diktats of khap panchayats can be brutal — excommunication from the local community and death orders are quite common. In that sense, khap panchayats are nothing more than goons against whom the state should not hesitate to take action. That they have been allowed to survive for so long in States such as Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh is a sin in itself. Hence, it would be proper for those in charge of law and order to crack the whip on khap panchayats. The rule of law must prevail.
