It’s dishonourble killings, say speakers

NEW DELHI - A man who spoke out against marriages within the same ‘gotra’ was isolated at a meeting here Wednesday where speaker after speaker denounced the growing number of ‘honour killings’.

Khap leader Baljeet Singh Malik said during a panel discussion on khap panchayats and honour killings: “The entire issue of honour killings is actually a non-issue. Honour killings ‘to hote hi nahin hai’ (honour killings don’t happen at all).”

“As far as the issue of same gotra marriages go, there is scientific proof that shows that when there are marriages within a family or clan, there are genetic defects in the offspring. The khap, which is an age-old way of life, has been just stressing on this,” he said.

Malik said the demand of the khap panchayats to change the Hindu Marriage Act to disallow same-gotra marriages is justified.

“If the Muslim personal law can be changed, why not the Hindu Marriage Act? There are lakhs of marriages happening every day, just because things have gone wrong in two-three of them, why blame the whole gotra system?” he asked.

But Kirti Singh, former member of the law commission, rebutted his views, saying: “A gotra may have thousands of millions of people who may not be related to each other remotely. Therefore, to stop someone from marrying somebody from the same gotra under the garb of science is ridiculous.”

“This entire issue of gotra and honour killing is more than what it seems. It’s also a case of gender crime. More often than not you will see it’s the girl’s family which takes extreme steps against her if she takes a decision to marry someone,” she added.

“Also, if you don’t want to marry someone from the same gotra or clan, it’s alright. But how can you impose your will on someone else who wants to?” Singh asked.

K.S. Money of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), said the term “honour killing” should be changed to ‘dishonourable killing’.

“These killings are not legally sanctionable. And the fact of the matter is that states have failed to protect human rights,” he said.

Som Pal, member of the Planning Commission, said the khaps should focus more on issues like female foeticide and dowry.

In a balancing act, he said: “No panchayat sanctions killings.”

On the issue of certain political leaders coming out in support of the khap panchayats’ views, Som Pal said: “Considering the Jat vote bank in Haryana, it is not wrong to say that this issue has led to political leanings.”