India’s top court said Monday the death penalty should be given to those found guilty of so-called honour killings, calling the crime a barbaric “slur” on the nation. India has seen an upsurge in such killings that mainly involve young couples who marry outside their caste or against their relatives’ wishes and are murdered to protect what is seen as the family’s reputation and pride. “It is time to stamp out these barbaric, feudal practices which are a slur on our nation,” the Supreme Court said.
There are no official figures on honour killings, though an independent study last year suggested that as many as 900 were being committed every year in the northern states of Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh. Many go unreported, with police and local politicians turning a blind eye to what some see as an acceptable form of traditional justice by families seeking to protect their honour.
“All persons who are planning to perpetrate ‘honour’ killings should know that the gallows await them,” Justices Markandeya Katju and Gyan Sudha Mishra said in their ruling, adding that no one can take law into their own hands. If someone is unhappy with the behavior of a relation, “the maximum he can do is to cut off social relations… but he cannot take the law into his own hands by committing violence or giving threats of violence,” the bench said. The court made the statements as it dismissed an appeal by Bhagawan Dass against a life sentence for strangling his daughter, Seema, in 2006 over an alleged extra-marital affair with a cousin.
India’s Supreme Court only awards the death penalty in what it calls the “rarest of rare” category. “In our opinion honour killings, for whatever reason, come within the category of rarest of rare cases deserving the death punishment,” the court said. However, when the Supreme Court does authorise executions, they are regularly delayed indefinitely or commuted by the president. Last August, Home Minister P. Chidambaram said he would present a bill in parliament which will provide specific, severe penalties to curb such killings.
