http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/5922_1475193,0015002100000000.htm
Rapists walk free after paying fine
S. Raju
Saharanpur,, August 28, 2005
On August 12, former additional sessions judge of Mumbai High Court Dr Laxmi Rao let off a rape accused with a day's imprisonment and a fine of Rs 50,000.
The same brand of justice was meted out last week by two village panchayats in Saharanpur's Badgoan area. In separate incidents, they let off two alleged rapists after fining them. The women's families were not allowed to go to the police.
In Simlana village, a teenager allegedly tried to rape a physically challenged Dalit woman.Though the woman managed to escape, a caste panchayat ordered the offender's family to pay Rs 25,000 to her.
"Not money, we want more stringent punishment for the man," said the woman's mother. Several villagers echoed her demand for stricter punishment and pledged to fight against the "excesses of the upper castes" in the village.
However, the SHO of Bargaon police station, Rishiraj Katheria, said no one had lodged a complaint though he admitted to having heard about the incident.
Barely a stone's throw away, in Deoband's Kohla Basti, another panchayat freed a rapist after slapping a fine of Rs 10,000. The girl, raped five months ago, is pregnant with the rapist's child.
The girl's father — a rickshaw-puller — refused to go to the police and sought the caste panchayat's help. Initially, the panchayat proposed marriage, but a dispute between the families played the spoilsport.
"The boy's family was asked to pay Rs 10,000," said Mohammad Rashid, a former town chairman, who took part in the panchayat.
Expressing full faith in the panchayat's verdict, the girl's father refused to go to the police. "I don't want the police to intervene. It is a family shame".
However, in the same breath he accepts that the compensation would take care of the cost of abortion. "It does not matter if her life is ruined. The panchayat is the final word," says Rashid.
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"Ours is a battle not for wealth or for power.
It is a battle for freedom. It is a battle for the reclamation of human personality."
- Dr BR Ambedkar
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