On May 9, a 16-year-old girl in Kodagu, Karnataka, became the lone girl to pass her Class 10 exams from her school. Her achievement was tinged with tragedy when that same day, she was engaged to a 33-year-old man. The engagement ceremony was interrupted by the District Child Protection Unit after an anonymous call, and her parents were made to promise that she would not be married off until she turned 18. However, the groom was angered by this intervention and turned up at her house later that day. He dragged her out, beheaded her, and fled with her head. The incident sent shock waves through the state and the police quickly tracked down and arrested the perpetrator.
This incident occurred shortly after another horrific case in Hubballi, where a first-year MCA student was stabbed to death on campus by a former classmate. The victim, Neha Hiremath, had allegedly been close to the perpetrator, Fayaz Khondunaik, but had distanced herself from him. Just hours before her death, a double murder rocked Bengaluru when a 46-year-old man killed his 25-year-old colleague at an event management company. The two were reportedly in a relationship, but she had recently broken it off. The victim’s mother tried to intervene and was bludgeoned to death by the perpetrator.
All three of these cases share a common thread: a man killed a girl or woman after she rejected his advances, broke up with him, or distanced herself from him. This is a clear manifestation of toxic masculinity, where men feel entitled to control and possess women and resort to violence when their advances are rebuffed.
Studies have shown that those who endorse the masculine honor ideal are more likely to feel insulted if a woman rejects them and respond with aggression. This is the same logic that is behind several acid attacks on women as well.
In the case of Neha’s murder, political parties, particularly the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), attempted to give it a communal color. Prime Minister Narendra Modi used the incident to stoke fear and make unfounded allegations about the Congress party’s appeasement of the Muslim community. However, the Ministry of Home Affairs has stated that the term ‘love jihad’ is not defined under the extant laws and no case of ‘love jihad’ has been reported by any of the Central agencies.
The communalization of such incidents puts immense pressure on the Muslim community to distance themselves from them. In Hubballi-Dharwad, for example, only Muslim traders and shopkeepers observed a voluntary bandh to condemn Neha’s murder. However, there were no such protests or condemnations for the beheading of the 16-year-old girl in Kodagu or the killing of the 25-year-old woman in Bengaluru. The only statements condemning the Kodagu girl’s beheading came from women’s activists.
While political parties make attempts to woo women during election time, issues such as women’s freedom to choose their partners and their safety never become independent election points. They are always subservient to other identities such as class, caste, and religion, as the recent three cases illustrate.
