UP village panchayats continue to harass lovers

Lucknow, Jan 15: 'Shoe slapping' seems to have become the standard punishment given to lovers in Uttar Pradesh as another incident emerges.

A village panchayat on Wednesday, Jan 13 reportedly forced a 22-year-old woman to slap her 26-year-old lover with a footwear and tonsure his head because the village did not agree with their relationship.

Besides this, the man's face was blackened and he was paraded semi-naked through the village, the police revealed on Thursday, Jan 14.

"Some elders caught the couple together talking and roaming in an orchard of the village and informed the panchayat members, who directed the family members of the woman to produce their daughter before the panchayat," Prem Saini, a resident of Aaldi village said.

"When the panchayat was about to deliver the punishment to the woman, her lover appeared before the panchayat and pleaded not to ill treat the woman. To this, the panchayat agreed on the condition that the woman would have to slap him five times with shoes and also shave his head," he added.

When the woman refused to do as told, the panchayat threatened to put her lover and his family out of the village. This pushed the woman to abuse and humiliate her lover.

The police, which learnt of the incident through local media, has promised to take action against all those who forced the woman to ill-treat her lover.

This was what the police assured when a similar incident emerged in Oct 2009, saying that the panchayat can not be allowed to behave in 'autocratic' manner.

In another incident in Sep 2009, two lovers, caught sitting together in a park, were forced to slap each other with shoes too.

OneIndia News