NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court today asserted that the illegal activities of ‘khap panchayats’ have to be stopped completely, saying the honour killings of inter-caste couples was a social evil that “guillotined” individual liberty and freedom of choice having a “catastrophic effect” on the society.
Terming honour crimes as an assault on human dignity and the majesty of the law, a bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra recommended that a law be brought to deal with offences which are “abhorrent to law”, as it laid down preventive, remedial and punitive measures to deal with these crimes.
The way the ‘khaps’ behave, it appears that they harbour the notion that “they are a law unto themselves or they are the ancestors of Caesar or, for that matter, Louis the XIV”, the bench, which also comprised Justices A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud, said.
Observing that the ‘khaps’ which subscribed to honour killings “without the slightest pangs of conscience”, it said the human rights of a daughter, brother, sister or son “are not mortgaged to the so-called or so-understood honour of family or clan or the collective”.
The top court said the ‘khap panchayats’ or such assemblies cannot take law into their hands or assume the character of the law implementing agency as that authority has not been conferred upon them under any law. (AGENCIES)
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