Indian police have arrested a man and accused him of beheading his own teenage daughter in a rage over her relationship with another man she disliked, BBC News reported on Thursday in what appears to be the latest horrific case. of the so-called “honor killing” in the Asian nation. Police in northern Uttar Pradesh said Sarvesh Kumar was arrested on his way to the local police station carrying his daughter’s head.
BBC News reports that local police released a video of Kumar confessing to the murder, explaining that he was angry to learn about his daughter’s relationship, came home to find her alone, locked her in a room and beheaded her. With a sharp object. .
Neighbors reported to police that Kumar carried his daughter’s head through Hardoi district on Wednesday after committing the alleged murder.
Sanjeev Verma / Hindustan Times / Getty
Honor killings are important problem in India, neighbor Pakistan, and other countries where family members – most often women and girls – are attacked and even killed by relatives for bringing perceived shame to the family. Such crimes are more common in rural communities where centuries-old traditions and deep-rooted cultural norms dictate the rules of everyday life.
According to the BBC, although there are no official statistics, it is believed that hundreds of people are killed in India every year by family members in connection with relationships or marriages that have opposed the wishes of their parents or other elders.
Honor killings are just one aspect of a much broader issue of violence against women and girls that India has been facing for years. The BBC said statistics compiled by India’s National Crime Evidence Bureau showed that more crimes were committed against women last year in Uttar Pradesh than any other Indian state.
In March 2020, India hanged four men for the brutal gang rape of a paramedic student in Delhi in 2012. The rape and murder of a 23-year-old woman sparked massive street protests across India and drew global attention to the plight of women. from India. .
But Arshad R. Zargar of CBS News reported that little has changed despite the outpouring of public outrage. Government data released in September 2020 that showed an average of 87 rapes were reported every day in the previous year – an increase of over 7% compared to 2018.
In January, an Indian court ruling that groping a child could not be considered sexual assault, as long as there was no “skin-to-skin contact” or “sexual intent,” was widely criticized by rights activists.
The ruling by Judge Pushpa V. Ganediwala of the Bombay High Court authorized a 39-year-old man who had been accused of sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl in 2016 for committing crimes.