The hands of a woman campaigning against child marriage were chopped off by a youth in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, it was reported yesterday.
The incident took place in the Madhya Pradesh town of Dhar Tuesday, an auspicious day in the Hindu calendar for solemnizing marriages, the Telegraph newspaper reported.
The youth knocked on the door of Shakuntala Verma, a supervisor in the state child and welfare department, saying he wanted directions to a house. When Verma stepped out, he chopped her hands off.
Her relatives rushed her to hospital in the nearby town of Indore where the doctors said she was out of danger after undergoing a nine-hour surgery.
The police said Verma was attacked because she had been touring nearby villages discouraging people from marrying under-age children.
Her brother Sushil said she had received threats from some villagers.
Verma had warned villagers that she would scrutinize birth certificates of all new grooms and brides.
Hours after the macabre attack, 50,000 marriages were solemnized in Madhya Pradesh in auspicious hours that come once a year. Weddings can be solemnized during these hours without a priest oveeing the wedding. The state authorities could not say how many of these were child marriages.
The marriage of boys under 21 and girls under 18 is illegal under Indian laws. But the practice of child marriage is still widely prevalent in remote and backward rural areas of the country, especially in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal.
Madhya Pradesh chief minister Babulal Gaur had created a flutter when he ruled out "serious action" against offenders in child marriage cases last week. "Social customs are stronger than laws," he had said.
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