In the news: stricter laws against honour killings?

Stricter law against honour killings coming: Moily

Union Minister for Law and Justice M Veerappa Moily says the Centre is coming up with a stricter provision in the law to stop honour killings

Alarmed by the steep rise in suspected honour killings, the central government has decided to bring in a Bill providing for prosecution of the entire khap panchayat for ordering violent punishment for young couples marrying against their diktats.

The central government will soon come out with a law against honour killings, and a draft has already been prepared, Law and Justice Minister M Veerappa Moily said on June 27, 2010.

“Several incidents of honour killing have been reported recently, which stunned the people. And I am also concerned and worried about the rise in such incidents,” said Moily after attending a regional meeting with chief justices of the Calcutta, Patna, Orissa and Jharkhand high courts and the law ministers of the four states.

According to Moily, under the new law members of khap panchayats who order the killing of couples who dare to go against the dictates of these panchayats will be treated as accomplices in the crime. Such cases will be tried by fast-track courts to provide speedy justice to the victims.

The Supreme Court too has taken serious note of the so-called honour killings and has sought the response of the central government and eight states including Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand. It has directed the authorities to explain measures being taken to prevent such terrible crimes.

Source: The Hindustan Times, June 28, 2010
The Indian Express, June 28, 2010

In the news:”‘Honour killings’: what needs to be done”

‘Honour killings’: what needs to be done, The Hindu, April 26, 2010

“Three weeks after District and Sessions Judge Vani Gopal Sharma sentenced in Karnal, Haryana, five persons to death and awarded life imprisonment to one person in a 2007 case of ‘honour killing,’ three incidents of a similar nature have been reported in the State.

The writing is on the wall but the khaps are clearly not prepared to give up. Incensed by the role of the news media, which took the implications of the trial court’s landmark judgment to places far and wide and created awareness among the people, the upholders of a reactionary, anti-human tradition gathered in large numbers at Kurukshetra on April 13 to redraw their strategy.”

In the news: “Khap Panchayat:signs of desperation”

Jagmati Sangwan, “Khap Panchayat :signs of desperation“, The Hindu, May 7, 2010.

“A recent landmark judgment by the Additional Sessions Court at Karnal in the Manoj-Babli “honour” killing case, in which five accused were given the death sentence, sent shock waves among caste panchayat leaders, as it reminded them that they were not above the Constitution. The court took serious note of the fact that the policemen deployed for the security of Manoj and Babli actually facilitated the accused in perpetrating the crime.”