World · India Bureau
Father Performs Last Rites for Living Daughter Over Inter-Caste Marriage
In a stark rejection of his daughter's marriage outside his community, a man in Uttar Pradesh's Chandauli district performed funeral rites for his living child. The daughter had eloped three months earlier to marry a man from a different caste against her family's wishes.
LSN India ·
A resident of Chandauli in Uttar Pradesh took the extreme step of performing pindaan—final rites traditionally reserved for the deceased—for his living daughter, effectively disowning her over her inter-caste marriage. The daughter had left her family home approximately three months prior and married a youth from the same village but belonging to a different caste community, defying her parents' wishes. Family members made repeated attempts to bring her back, but the daughter refused to return home. Faced with her continued refusal to reconcile, the father chose to conduct the ritual funeral ceremony on a day traditionally reserved for ancestral rites, symbolically severing ties with his child. The incident highlights ongoing tensions around caste-based marriages in rural Uttar Pradesh, where inter-community unions continue to face significant family and social resistance in many communities.