Hence, we have arrested them under Indian Penal Code sections related to promoting enmity between groups, intentional insult provoking breach of peace, criminal intimidation and a criminal act committed by several people.Fed up with this boycott, a 19-year-old girl from one of the ostracised families has now registered a case against the panchayat with the Shrigonda police, which subsequently arrested 10 of the panchayat’s members for meting out the discriminatory treatment.”Ms Gaikwad further said, “In our community, girls hardly study and are married off before they are 22-23 years of age. This triggered protests, with the then panchayat subsequently boycotting the family concerned. We also have more than 30 boys who are between 25 and 40 years old, when boys here are mostly married before they turn 25.Another relative of umbrella with logo hers was apparently boycotted by the panchayat on the grounds that the person had married a sibling.”The 10 arrested members of the panchayat were identified as Uttam Phulmali, Shetiba Kakade, Anna Bapu Phulmali, Subhash Phulmali, Tatya Avad, Uttam Shetiba Phulmali, Gulab Kakade, Saheba Kakade, Rama Phulmale and Gangaram Male. It all allegedly began even before Independence, when the girl’s great-grandfather married a Maratha girl.
But the panchayat has refused to accept us. But she stayed unfazed and lodged a complaint nonetheless. In total, 350 members related to the families stand ostracised by the panchayat at present.”She added that, at first, a member of the panchayat had intimidated her against approaching the police.”She added, “We are not allowed to marry within the community as we are considered to be related to each other. But our money has not been accepted. Nobody from our community talks to us.Finally, after all these years, the 19-year-old girl, Mangal Bapu Gaikwad, a first-year student of BA at Maharaja Shivajiraje Shinde College in Srigonda, lodged a police complaint against the 10 panchayat members. There are many other boycotted families whom the panchayat has taken back into its fold in return for money.Arun Jadhav, a member of Lokadhikar Andolan, a voluntary organisation that is helping the boycotted families, said, “We held a dharna in front of the collector’s office and the police superintendent’s office demanding that the caste panchayat revoke the order to boycott these families.
Rajesh Mantonde, police sub-inspector, Srigonda, said, “We have asked the panchayat to take these families back within the fold of the caste, but they refused. That is why we decided to approach the police. The superintendent of police also met the caste panchayat members, but they refused to listen to him.Ms Gaikwad told The Asian Age, “We are not invited for functions like marriages, engagements, social programmes and even funerals.” She added, “The gravest problem we have been facing all these years is that nobody from our community is ready to marry youngsters from the 25 boycotted families, even though they have more than 25 girls in the age bracket of 20-35 years.”.Ms Gaikwad’s grandfather and father did not maintain ties with the community as a result of her great-grandfather being ostracised.For more than 70 years, 25 families from the nomadic Tiramli Nandi community in Ahmednagar district have been ostracised by their caste panchayat.”Ms Gaikwad said, “Elders from both the families have requested the caste panchayat to include us in the fold of the caste and have even offered monetary compensation for the same
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