those who decided that- if u marry ur way u shd b dead.

In lucknow representatives of various village councils from Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana and Delhi met to express their support for the traditional honour killing of couples who marry in the same gotra (clan). These councils known as ‘Khap councils’ are notorious for their vicious campaign against couples getting married within the same clan.

“Village councils are doing the right thing. They should be killed. There is no other solution to it. If they go for love marriage in the same clan then real brother and sister should also marry. Why should parents look for grooms and bridegrooms for their children,” said Mahendra Singh Tikait, head of Baliyan village council, Uttar Pradesh.

The meeting comes nearly two months after a man was killed for marrying a girl in the same clan in Dhrana village of northern Haryana. Village councils in Haryana are notorious for issuing diktats against couples who marry within the same clan. Caste system runs deep in the rural areas where people are still bound to the ancient principles and practices. There are many incidents where same clan marriages have been opposed and couples subjected to humiliation and even killed by the angry villagers.

The most disturbing aspect of this meet is that the ppl sat down to congratulate the panchayats on their ‘honour uphelding acts’ and no one was there to notice. The local police@the time of the killing is usually a party to it, the politicians are so keen to cash few votes that the death of 2 lovers is not important but the society?

What happened to the Mango ppl that we are? there are peopl who just sat down and decided that a girl and a boy of the same village, if marry then can and should be killed, as simple as that. and it did not trouble us much. few news channels ran stupid love songs nd displayed images of bodies hanging form a tree, but not a single man from the police, burocracy ot politics has taken a stand.  Jouros to push these stories as ‘off beat’ stuff and run it on sunday but not of hte wedding season is near- it wud not go well wiht the 2 lakh Rs lehenga in the ad.

words fall short to describe the frustration i feel

the vulture culture- when blood becomes our ink

 I never thought i could see some one cry with dry eyes. Her eyes were dry casue they were replaying the scene when her 17 yr old was trying to make an extra buck, his fault- what he thought was metal came out to be an unexploded live shell. While the 17 yrs old dies on the spot wiht this 14 yr old friend, both of whom found the shell while bathing in the river which ran next to their colony/skum(u choose the term), their mothers were as quiet as the blood stains all over the walls of the area.

Dead bodies are never pleasant, neither are injuries but still Police gave the emotionless quotes explaining what we all saw, residents walked in shock and journalists- well they had something more to do. Most wanted to click the pool of blood, while flies were on it, not flying. Many were feeling frustrated that the bodies were taken just before they arrieved. Many compared this blast to anoher blast where they could capture the dead body’s limbs in an order that provoked pain and puke. Few were disappointed on the fact that the families were not crying enuf, and when one female member started to beat her chest, they all lept to capture it.

There were few who pushed the camera to the lady whose neighbours had lost their sons and asked her to detail what she saw, wht she thought and wht did she do. After 5 min there was que to take a shot of the lady becasue she was hapy to pose wiht the blood stains, the shop where the havoc happened and the slippers which still had signs of the ppl who once wore it. While the police blame the explosion on the shell a 60 yr oldl, who has been living in the Dhakka Basti of the Azad Colony where the blast occurred, said that the children died of poverty, “The blast took place because the children were trying to extract copper from a bomb in the shop. They were not educated enough to know that it was a bomb and hungry enough to hit it with a heavy rock.”

the distant attitude of the police, i understand. the shocked neighbours i understand even those who were posing, but US, i am not sure. As we counted the dead and the injured a senior walked upto me and told me not to get disturbed, he dint say any more. because at some level the more pain we see, the more we write. Does blood fuel our ink?