Nashik: A widow who managed to escape inhuman punishment meted out by Kanjarbhat Jat Panchayat (caste court) for refusing her brother-in-law’s advances continues to be pressurised to undergo the punishment. The punishment requires the victim, Chhaya Satish Tamaichekar (29), to brand her sons’ palms with red hot axes and be paraded semi-nude with one woman hitting her with hot sticks and another woman throwing hot balls of bread on her.
Speaking to Deccan Chronicle on Tuesday from her parents’ house in Ozer town of Niphad district where she fled from her in-laws in Nandurbar, Ms Tamaichekar said, “The jat panchayat is pressurising me and my family to undergo punishment. As no action was taken by Nandurbar police despite several complaints, I have today sent an application to the Superintendent of Police (SP), Nashik.”
According to Ms Tamaichekar’s complaint (documents available with this newspaper), she married in 2000 and her husband died of some illness in 2013. He had opened a small grocery shop in Nandurbar, which she continued to run after his death. “I was stalked by my husband’s cousin, Rakesh Bachhu Tamaichekar, but I refused his advances. He even promised to desert his wife and family or sell his fields for my sake but I spurned him. He poisoned my mother-in-law and her son’s minds and the family beat me up. During the beating, Rakesh pretended to save me, touching me inappropriately,” said Ms Tamaichekar.
“I filed a case with Nandurbar police station and called my parents. A jat panchayat was held by the panch, including Deepak Bachhu Tamaichekar, Dnyaneshwar Gumane and Kanti Netle. Panchayat judge Deepak said they had seen me with another man and cast aspersions on my character. While the hearings continued, I again went to Nandurbar police station but they threw me out. In the final hearing of the panchayat, I was to brand my children on Padwa in 2016 and be paraded semi-nude,” she said.
