‘Honour killing’ victims make dramatic reappearance (Second Lead)

LUCKNOW - A couple in Uttar Pradesh declared dead by police in an “honour killing” Sunday made a dramatic reappearance, even as an incensed father threw his daughter from the roof of his house after her “secret” marriage, while another girl was killed for insisting on marrying according to her choice.

Ajit Saini and Anju Tomar of Muzaffarnagar district, who were declared dead by police after disappearing for the past few days, followed by the identification of a highly mutilated body as that of Saini, showed up before the police in the district.

Anju’s brother, Anuj was arrested Saturday and admitted to murdering Ajit.

“I hacked him for the sake of honour… I wanted to save the prestige of my family and, therefore, killed him,” Anuj told reporters. Police suspected that Anuj had killed his sister as well.

Saini and Anju had eloped, and on reading news reports about their “murder”, promptly called one of their relatives who, in turn, informed the Muzaffarnagar police.

Additional Director General of Police Brij Lal however maintained that the police were not at all at fault. “The police most naturally believed the confession by Anju’s brother. And what further confirmed the theory was the identification of the body by Ajit’s own family members,” he said.

Police have now launched a fresh investigation to ascertain the true identity of the mutilated body.

“The fact remains that Anju’s brother actually killed someone, so we have directed our men to carry our a fresh probe into the whole affair,” Brij Lal said.

“Members of both families have been detained for questioning,” he added.

In another case, a 21-year-old MBA student was “critically” injured in Meerut after falling victim to the wrath of her father, a police sub-inspector posted at Ghaziabad.

“Parul, a first year MBA student, married her classmate Dileep Kumar at a temple during the course of a college trip to Vaishno Devi temple earlier this month. However, no sooner the girl broke the news about her marriage to her parents, the father started beating her up and eventually flung her off the terrace,” police circle officer Tribhuvan Bisen told IANS over telephone from Meerut, 400 km from here.

Parul’s father, Suresh Pal Singh was not ready to accept her marriage to a boy of her choice.

The helpless girl was rushed to the hospital by her neighbours, who gave an eyewitness account of the brutality committed by her father Saturday at their family home.

In the third instance, a girl was allegedly hacked to death by her father and brother in Kaushambi district, about 260 km from here, Saturday.

According to police, 19-year-old Soni, a resident of Khalilabad village in the district, was hacked to death by her father Bachu Lal Kori, for insisting on marrying a boy of the same village.

“Kori, accompanied by his brother and son, thrashed Soni to death and then chopped her body into pieces before abandoning it in the fields outside a temple,” a police spokesman told IANS. The father was not ready to approve a love marriage even though both the girl and boy belonged to the same caste.