india

Updated: Oct 01, 2019 06:47 IST

A man and a woman were held captive, brutally tortured and forced to drink urine in Rajasthan’s Udaipur district on Sunday, police said on Monday, weeks after a similar incident in the state.

A police official said women were also among those who tortured the couple. The villagers chopped off their hair, forced them to wear garlands made of shoes and burnt them with cigarette butts.

The official said the incident took place in Madhikpur Kalbeliya Basti under Kheroda police station area of Udaipur on Sunday.

“The couple fled from the village on Saturday without social settlement and permission of their community. On Sunday, some villagers traced their location, kidnapped them and later tortured them,” he said.

The police officer added a team reached the spot after they receiver information about the thrashing and freed them. A case has been booked against 12 people and further investigation is on, he said.

The couple was attacked because the woman established a ‘nata’ relationship with the man without the permission of their community leaders.

Nata pratha is a custom that allows men to enter into a relationship with as many women and it is mostly practised amongst the Bheel community of the state.

Traditionally, both men and women are supposed to be married before or widowed to get into a nata, but the custom has evolved to include single people as well.

A man and women were beaten up and forced to drink urine by locals in Nagaur district earlier in September. They were tortured because the woman’s family were unhappy with her relationship with the man, who was her nephew.

Rajasthan has seen a 66% rise in crimes against women between January and July this year as compared to the same period last year, as per the police department data.

The data shows crimes against women have registered an overall increase of 66.78%. The total number of cases registered between January and July is 25,420 as compared to 15,242 cases registered during the corresponding period in 2018.