GADAG: A district court in Gadag, Karnataka, sentenced four people to death on Friday for their involvement in the 2019 honor killing of an inter-caste couple.
The convicted individuals—Parashuram Rathod, Shivappa Rathod, Ravi Rathod, and Ramesh Rathod—were relatives of 23-year-old Gangamma Rathod, who, along with her husband, 29-year-old Ramesh Madar, was murdered two years after their inter-caste marriage.
Gangamma, a member of the Lambani community and a garment factory worker, had fallen in love with Ramesh, a driver from the Madiga community. Despite opposition from Gangamma’s family, the couple eloped and married in 2017. They later lived in Shivamogga and Bengaluru, where they had two children.
Believing that time had healed the rift with her family, Gangamma returned with her husband and children to their native village of Lakkalkatti during Deepavali in 2019. However, on November 6, 2019, Parashuram and the others killed the couple. Following the incident, Gajendragad police registered a case under various sections of the IPC and filed a chargesheet on January 18, 2020.
