Thaindian News

Karnal (Haryana), May 10 (IANS) A family in a village in Karnal district of Haryana is being interrogated by the police for strangulating a young couple, including a pregnant woman, in love to punish them for staying together. Jasbir Singh, 27, and his companion Sunita, who was six months pregnant, were murdered in Ballah village, about 35 km from here. The woman’s family was opposed to their daughter, a divorcee, living with Jasbir.

Emboldened after committing the murder, the family even took the barbaric step of throwing the bodies of the couple outside their house to send a clear message to other villagers that going against wishes of the community and family would not be tolerated.

In what is being seen by the police and district authorities as an outright honour killing, Sunita’s relatives and father Om Prakash, who belongs to the dominant Jat community, first kidnapped the couple from Machhroli village near Panipat and killed them in Ballah village Friday.

Police officials said the main provocation for the killing was that Sunita’s family had come to know that she was pregnant.

A.S. Chawla, the Karnal district police chief, said a case of murder and conspiracy had been registered against Om Prakash and 28 others. He said that some suspects had been rounded up in this connection.

The woman’s family remained unrepentant even after the incident. Sunita’s mother Roshni Devi backed the action of her husband and others in killing the couple, saying that the family had “saved its reputation”.

Locals admitted that some villagers in Ballah had hailed and even applauded the killings Friday morning.

The police are likely to question them all.

Honour killings are not uncommon in Haryana, especially in areas dominated by the Jat community.

Last year, the bodies of another young couple, Manoj and Babli, were recovered from a canal in Kaithal district after they were murdered and thrown into the canal by the woman’s relatives.

The state’s illegal “khap” (community) panchayats have also been doling out extra-judicial rulings to couples for getting married by violating social norms.