A Dalit youth died six days after being brutally beaten by his wife's family in Bhitarwar area of Madhya Pradesh. The village panchayat had imposed a fine of Rs 51,000 and socially boycotted him.
Gwalior. The death of a 25-year-old Dalit youth in Harsi village of Bhitarwar area of Madhya Pradesh has once again raised questions on caste violence. The youth was attacked by his wife’s family. After battling between life and death for six days, he breathed his last on Sunday evening.
How did the incident happen
Omprakash Batham was married to Shivani Jha in January this year. Shivani comes from an upper caste family and her family strongly opposed this relationship. Omprakash came to the village to meet his parents on August 19 to celebrate Rakshabandhan. During this time, Shivani’s family came to his house and attacked him brutally.
According to the police, Shivani’s father Dwarka Prasad Jha along with relatives Rajesh alias Raju Jha, Uma Ojha and Sandeep Sharma attacked. It is alleged that all of them dragged Om Prakash out of the house and beat him with sticks and rods. Meanwhile, when wife Shivani tried to intervene, she also got injured.
Son returned on Rakshabandhan
The pain of the family hurt by the attack cannot be expressed in words. Sitting on her kutcha courtyard in Harsi village, Om Prakash’s mother says crying, “He had come just to see me. Every son wants to celebrate Rakshabandhan with his mother. They had a court marriage and the girl also wanted to live with him, yet she was killed so brutally.”
Used to get threats
Actually, this conflict had started from 2023 itself. When Om Prakash and Shivani tried to run away from home and get married for the first time, the police found them. But Shivani clearly said that she is an adult and wants to live with her husband. After this, both of them lived in different places—sometimes in Madhya Pradesh, sometimes in Uttar Pradesh—and in January this year, they registered their marriage in court.
But they had to pay a heavy price for this relationship. The village panchayat imposed a fine of Rs 51,000 on Omprakash and socially boycotted the family. Not only this, Shivani’s father had openly threatened that Omprakash should never step inside the village boundary.
Legal action
He was treated in a private hospital in Gwalior for six days, but Omprakash died on Sunday evening. In this case, Belgada police station in-charge Ajay Singh Sikarwar said that initially a case of assault was registered against the attackers. Now after the death of the youth, a case of murder has been registered against 12 people. The main accused Dwarka Prasad Jha is absconding and the police is searching for him.
Rajan Chaudhary
Courtesy : Hindi News