‘I thought they would accept us one day’ – 4 years after honour killing, fear of death looms over Palakkad family

According to the family and investigators, it was Aneesh’s caste – he was a painter from the backward Kodachi-Kalla caste against Haritha’s upper class and landowning Saiva Vellala (Pillai) family — that prompted the murder. At the time of the incident, Haritha and Aneesh had been married for only 89 days.

Both Prabhukumar and Suresh Kumar are now in jail, but that hasn’t stopped fear of death from permeating the everyday lives of Haritha and her in-laws.

“When she has to attend her BBA class at Marian College in Koduvayur, my husband (Arumughan) drops her off on a bike. Then I go to college in the afternoon to accompany her back home. If she has an exam, I wait until she comes out,” Radha, who was a farmhand until her son’s murder prompted her to stop reporting to work, tells The Indian Express.

Aneesh and Haritha. (special arrangement)

Claiming that “my family had threatened to finish me off too”, Haritha says she and Aneesh, a Class 5 dropout and the fourth among eight children, fell in love when she was in Class 10. Her family was well off, running a sewing machine business and also owning some agricultural land.

“Our relationship started during my school days. A year on, my parents and relatives came to know about it. To break us up, my mother would assault me and my father would verbally abuse me. But Aneesh gave me courage and hope,” says Haritha.

Unlike Haritha’s family, Aneesh’s side knew nothing of the relationship initially, says Radha. “We only knew when they got married.”

In 2020, when Haritha turned 18, her family started looking for grooms, eventually arranging a match with a man from Coimbatore. On September 27 that year, when her parents were in Coimbatore to fix the match, Haritha married Aneesh at a local temple.

“We had previously decided that I should continue with my education and secure a government job. But when my parents tried to rush through with another proposal, we decided to get married,” she says.

When they found out, Haritha’s furious family filed a police complaint and the couple was summoned to the local police station. The couple was eventually told that it could live together and Haritha’s family was warned against “harassing” them.

According to Haritha, however, trouble began right outside the police station, when her father threatened her saying the life of her thali (a sacred yellow thread worn by many South Indian brides to signify being married) “will be only for three months”.

Their houses located just a kilometre apart — and sensing danger — the couple kept away from Elamannam for a week, instead staying with the family of Aneesh’s brother Arun in Alathur. However, they eventually returned to the Elamannam house that Aneesh shared with his parents and five other siblings.

Back in Elamannam, the couple assumed the threats would die down and that Haritha’s family would eventually come to accept her choice. What they didn’t expect was her father and uncle murdering her husband.

“We didn’t make plans to move since all of Aneesh’s family members live nearby. Besides, such problems eventually get resolved with time. I thought one day my parents would accept our marriage and welcome Aneesh into their lives,” says Haritha.

On December 25 — the 90th day of the couple’s marriage — Aneesh and his brother Arun had gone to a nearby junction at Manamkulambu to run household errands. His brother had stopped for a soda and Aneesh was waiting on a two-wheeler outside a shop when Prabhukumar and Suresh arrived on their bikes and attacked him with the iron rods they were carrying, dragging him to a nearby ditch.

When Arun, on hearing his brother’s cry for help, tried to intervene, they threatened to beat him up too. Then Suresh produced a knife and stabbed Aneesh multiple times, fleeing with his brother soon after.

By the time some locals took him to a hospital, Aneesh had already died. According to the postmortem report, he had 19 fatal wounds.

Radha believes there could be another reason why Haritha’s family disliked the relationship. “I had worked in the paddy field of Haritha’s maternal uncle for many years. They might have thought my son marrying Haritha as an insult to them,” she says.

According to Aneesh’s oldest brother Anil, the couple continued to face threats throughout the brief marriage and even complained to the police. “But no action was taken,” he says.

For Haritha, going from her well-to-do concrete house to Aneesh’s poorer home with no road access made for a significant change. The family has limited means, barely getting by with Arumughan’s daily wage of Rs 750 from the painting projects he undertakes in Palakkad town.

Despite these challenges, she appears to have found solace in her husband’s family. The tragic death of her husband had affected a few exams, but she now plans to go on with her plans — finishing her BBA, clearing Public Service Commission exams and eventually securing an MBA — with her in-laws’ support. “Aneesh’s parents and his siblings take care of me very well. I don’t feel anything lacking here,” she says.

After Aneesh’s murder, the state government offered Haritha an ex-gratia compensation of Rs 10 lakh from the chief minister’s distress relief fund. “I bought three cents of land (approximately 1,306.677 sq. feet) using that money. I want to build a house. A job and a house are my dreams. I have already petitioned the government for a job,” she says.

Haritha hasn’t been in touch with her family since the incident, even avoiding her husband’s murder trial and going to court only when she was called for examination.

“At the court, I didn’t even look at the faces of my father and uncle. I want the judiciary to give them a more severe punishment than life term and will petition the government to appeal against the trial court sentence. Because nobody should have to face this fate,” she says.