Caste kills more in India than C-virus

On the eve of Women’s Day, news began to break about the suicide of Maruthi Rao in Khairatabad. Rao had been accused of murdering Pranay Perumalla, a young dalit, for marrying his daughter, in 2018.

Police reports, meanwhile, say that another body had been found, this time at Rao’s farmhouse, a month back. Pranay’s murder case was also coming to trial after police filed a 1,600page chargesheet. Relatives say there was also an ongoing property dispute between Rao and his brother. Perhaps, Rao sought solace in Amrutha’s return, but she was steadfast and that did not come about.

The problem is the fact that no one shamed Rao right at the start. This is the reason why caste murders are so common in our society. In 2018, Gaddi Kumar, belonging to the Yadav community, was found dead in Shankarapatnam of Karimnagar district. It is said that he had been in love with a Goud girl. The girl went on to reveal that her relatives had killed him.

In 2017, Manthani Madhukar, a dalit man, was killed; sparking off outrage and resulting in a second post-mortem after politicians and relatives of the Munnuru Kapu girl he had been dating tried to pass off his death as suicide. Till date, the post-mortem report hasn’t come out.

A few days after Pranay’s murder, Sandeep, a dalit man, was attacked for marrying Madhavi, an upper caste woman, by Madhavi’s father, Manohara Chary near Gokul Theatre in Hyderabad. Both suffered injuries. Madhavi is still undergoing surgeries. Sandeep’s mother, a widow, is taking care of her despite financial stress.

In February 2019, there were two other murders — those of Shushruta, a dalit pharmacy graduate, and her four-month-old boy, Devansh. They were burnt alive by Ramesh, the husband, who belongs to a backward class. The incident happened at Ghatkeswar near Hyderabad. Shushruta had been tortured from day one by her inlaws. She had been driven out of her marital home. Shushruta struggled for justice, knocked on the doors of every institution, including the state human rights commission. She had wanted to challenge her husband who said, “dalit women do not stick to one person, they have loose morals”.

If we collect data nationwide, we will find more people dying of “honour killings” than on the border or of an epidemic. These days, parents match the financial status of the bride and groom before agreeing to a marriage. But when it comes to marrying dalits, women are deserted and men murdered.

There is another difference when it comes to dalit men and women. When a dalit man marries a dominant caste woman, it is called an Ambedkarite marriage. If something similar is done by a woman, it is still seen as betrayal by the family.

The important question is, how successful are parentally arranged marriages?

It is shocking to hear a woman police officer say that children who marry of their own choice are being unfaithful to their parents. India boasts of being a progressive society and now with the visit of Mr Trump, the Indian diaspora, too, wants us to believe that we have reached the pinnacle of progress. But we are utterly wrong in treating marriage as a family affair, outside the purview of the courts and the law.

The fact is that we have failed to understand simple truths necessary for the success of the family. No family will survive unless we respect the individual’s freedoms. Love, failed or successful, erases the manmade gap between castes and religions, gives hope to a society.

Sujatha Surepally is a professor of sociology at Satvahana University and a dalit and women’s rights activist