“We have removed the blot.”

May 16th, 2008

Indian village proud after double honor killing | U.S. | Reuters

BALLA, India Reuters – Five armed men burst into the small room and courtyard at dawn, just as 21-year-old, 22-week pregnant, Sunita was drying her face on a towel.

They punched and kicked her stomach as she called out for her sleeping boyfriend “Jassa”, 22-year-old Jasbir Singh, witnesses said. When he woke, both were dragged into waiting cars, driven away and strangled.

Their bodies, half-stripped, were laid out on the dirt outside Sunitas fathers house for all to see, a sign that the familys “honor” had been restored by her cold-blooded murder.

A week later, the village of Balla, just a couple of hours drive from Indias capital New Delhi, stands united behind the act, proud, defiant almost to a man.

…

“From society’s point of view, this is a very good thing,” said 62-year-old farmer Balwan Arya, sitting smoking a hookah in the shade of a tree in a square with other elders from the village council or panchayat. “We have removed the blot.”

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Filed under: religion sucks, the feck?, women's issues | Comments (2)

2 Responses to ““We have removed the blot.””

already_taken on May 16, 2008 11:30 pm
I assume that the facts are as reported. That said, this description of events would be hard to believe if I hadn’t read similar stories in the past. Writing from an American point of view I find the motivations of the actors in this story incomprehensible – the consequences of their actions abhorant.
I can think of several ways to make sense of this. One is that the executioners and the 62-year old farmer are embodiments of evil on earth. Another thought is that they are otherwise reasonable human beings somehow caught in the sway of an evil philosophy or belief system.
The openness of the farmer indicates that he clearly does not view these actions as evil. Otherwise, he would not comment or deny the facts rather than declare them good. I am not a relativist about morality, but it is clear to me that in this story I am peering into a culture or subculture whose moral code is different than mine. That conclusion may seem trivially obvious, but I don’t think it is. I think it is often lost in the fury of indignation.
SuperBadGirl on May 17, 2008 8:45 am
It is a moral code which devalues one segment of society for the advantage of the other segment(s). While it may be the prevailing ideology in their part of the world, careful thought and consideration would show any of them that this was not morally acceptable.

I believe that in these situations a few perpetrate the crime to retain power and the status quo, the rest go along out with it out of fear, knowing that it’s wrong. Those who say they support it either do support it because it benefits them or they don’t support it and lie because they fear reprisal. You can’t tell me that the girl’s female relatives thought that she deserved death.

Read this story about a girl in Iraq murdered by her family for “falling in love” with a British soldier, as well:

Recalling Rand’s murder, her weeping mother Leila Hussein said: “I screamed and called out for her two brothers so they could get their father away. But when he told them the reason, instead of saving her they helped him end her life.”

Abdel-Qader Ali stood on the girl’s throat until she suffocated and then stabbed her, all the time shouting that his honour was being cleansed.

He was arrested and released within two hours. Sergeant Ali Jabbar of Basra police said: “The father has very good contacts in the Basra government.”

Because her family considered her impure, Rand was given only a simple burial. Her uncles spat in her grave to show their disgust.

Two weeks later her mother demanded a divorce from Ali, and she now campaigns against honour killings.

She lives in fear of reprisals. “I was beaten and had my arm broken by him,” she said. “No man can accept being left by a woman in Iraq.”