The deep-rooted caste system in this backward district came to the fore again when the parents of a 16-year-old girl decided to ‘abandon’ her after she had eloped with a Dalit youth, and declined to guarantee her safety and security.
After the parents at Kathayan in the Mudukulathur police limit told the local Judicial Magistrate (JM) court that they would not take the girl back and refused to give a written undertaking, guaranteeing her safety, Magistrate Mohanram ordered on Friday that she be kept in a home, though the girl insisted on going with her parents, police said.
Allirajan, a temporary worker at the local electricity board, and Vanitha Rani, a farm worker, in a virtual disapproval of their daughter’s love affair with the Dalit youth, told the Magistrate that they could not be held responsible if the girl committed suicide at home when they went for work, the police said.
On the Magistrate’s order, the girl was admitted to the reception home for girl children at Muthupatti in Madurai for transit stay on Friday, police said.
The girl was awaiting the SSLC examination results, when she eloped with R. Saranraj, 22, a canteen manager in a private nursing home in Chennai, on May 16.
On a complaint by her father, the Mudukulathur police registered a case under Section 366 (A) of the IPC (abducting or inducing woman to compel her marriage) and launched a search, sending special teams to Madurai and Coimbatore.
Sensing that the police were zeroing in on them, Saranraj brought the girl to Sivaganga on Thursday evening and absconded, leaving her at the JM court-I. After arranging her stay at a local home on Thursday night, the magistrate transferred the case to the JM court at Mudukulathur, the next day, police said.
When contacted, CWC Chairperson R. Sakunthala said the case was not referred to the commission by the Mudukulathur court. However, the CWC would arrange further studies and safe custody of the girl, if she was handed over to it.
The girl has passed SSLC, scoring 398 marks.
Recently, a mother and her family members had murdered a 22-year-old pregnant woman in the district, hiring mercenaries, for she had married a man from outside the community.
