A kangaroo court in western Assam’s Goalpara district thrashed a couple and forced them to marry in a case of moral policing, the second in two months in the area.
The police in the district’s Rangjuli, about 95 km west of Guwahati, arrested one Kurban Ali on Thursday for organising a “trial court” that prescribed a thrashing for the “immoral” couple with sticks. Ali, police said, was the “judge” of the court.
“The Rangjuli police registered a case after the video of the trial went viral yesterday [Wednesday]. We have also cautioned the people against taking law into their own hands,” Varnali Deka, Goalpara’s Deputy Commissioner, said.
The local police said the incident happened in Kheropara village on June 17. The trial, videotaped, was uploaded on social media on Wednesday after the couple left for Hyderabad for work.
“We acted soon after the video went viral and picked up the main accused. Almost everyone in the village, including the family members of the couple, attended the trial, but we have identified three more persons for assault,” Bhabesh Biswas, officer in-charge of Rangjuli Police Station, told The Hindu .
The man seen in the video beating the couple with a stick was the woman’s brother, he said.
Villagers told the police that they were suspicious of the relationship between the man, who was married, and the woman, a divorcee. The man, from another village, was in the habit of frequenting the woman’s house.
“The villager caught the two after he stayed at her house on the night of June 16. The trial was held the next morning and the village court topped the caning with a diktat for the couple to get married,” a police officer handling the case said.
A cleric solemnised their marriage on June 19, a day before the two left for Hyderabad.
A similar incident took place on April 8 at Paikan, about 30 km from Rongjuli. In that case, a Garo tribal woman was kicked and punched for riding pillion on the motorcycle of her Muslim friend. The district police later arrested 12 men on the basis of a video of the assault uploaded on social media.
