DHARMAPURI: A 24-year-old woman filed a petition with the office of the Superintendent of Police in Dharmapuri on Friday alleging that villagers had forced her to prostrate before over a hundred villagers after she eloped with her lover.
She also alleged that the village elders demanded a fine of Rs 5 lakh and threatened that she and her parents could be excommunicated from the village if she didn’t comply.
According to the petition filed with SP Bandi Gangadhar, about a year ago the woman, who has a one-year-old child and hails from near Pochampalli, left her husband for a 35-year-old man working in a lumber mill in Bengaluru.
Suspecting foul play, the woman’s parents filed a missing person complaint. Police found the couple hiding in Bengaluru and brought them back to their native village. However, the village elders, at the request of the woman’s parents, asked the police to withdraw the case.
The Kallavi police said the missing person complaint was at the Nagarasampatti police station and the couple was located. “However, before we could proceed with the investigation, the petitioner withdrew the case and requested the police to drop the investigation,” police said, noting that it is not unusual for such matters to be dropped.
The woman’s family took her and her lover to the temple square where village elders conducted a 'kattapanchayat' (kangaroo court). Here, the village elders allegedly demanded that the woman prostrate herself before the hundreds of villagers for besmirching the village’s reputation. They are said to have warned her that she and her parents would be excommunicated if she did not comply.
Further, they allegedly told the 35-year-old man to pay a fine of Rs 5 lakh “to right his wrong”. Following the incident, the woman filed the petition.
Police officials told The New Indian Express that a CSR has been registered and all parties involved are being investigated. “It is too early for an FIR. Only after a comprehensive inquiry will action be taken,” police said.