India of 2025: Dalit groom’s wedding procession in Gujarat was protected by 145 policemen, yet attempts were made to harass him
A Dalit groom from Banaskantha district of Gujarat says that till date no Dalit groom had ridden a mare in his village. Gujarat Police also used drone cameras to monitor the wedding procession.
Published on: 07 Feb 2025, 10:30 am
Gujarat: Another shocking news of Dalit oppression in modern India has come from Gujarat. Hundreds of policemen had to be present in the wedding procession so that the Dalit groom could ride a mare. He is from Ahmedabad city. The groom is a lawyer by profession. He had demanded police protection for the wedding procession fearing some untoward incident.
According to the Indian Express report , the incident is from Gadalwada village of Palanpur tehsil of Banaskantha district. Here, 145 policemen attended a wedding on 6 February. The groom’s name is Mukesh Parecha. On 22 January, he had written a letter to the Superintendent of Police (SP) expressing his apprehension of an untoward incident at his wedding. He had also demanded police protection.
Parecha said in his letter to the SP, “In our village, the Scheduled Caste (SC) people have never performed Ghudchadhi (wedding ritual of riding a mare). I will be the first person to perform Ghudchadhi. In view of the possibility of any untoward incident, we should be given police protection.”
After this, a wedding procession was taken out on horseback under strict police surveillance in the village. Gadh Police Station SHO K.M. Vasava said, “We had deployed 145 personnel for the wedding arrangements, including an inspector and three sub-inspectors. The wedding procession was taken out peacefully.”The procession was taken out under police protection. I was riding a mare, so nothing happened. But when I got off the mare and sat in my car, we had travelled only 500 metres when someone threw a stone at our car. Then, SHO Vasava himself drove the car and took us out of there. MLA Jignesh Mevani from Vadgam was also present on this occasion.Parecha, Practitioner, Banaskantha District Court
Mukesh said that we will lodge a complaint with the police about the stone pelting in a day or two. Meanwhile, Inspector Vasava said that drone cameras were also used to monitor the program. We saw the footage but there was no incident of stone pelting. The wedding procession was taken out peacefully. But when the groom alleged that stones were being thrown, I drove his car and dropped him to the village where the wedding was to take place.
Two weeks ago, a similar news came from Ajmer district of Rajasthan. Here too, 75 policemen had attended the wedding of the groom who came from a Dalit family. They too had expressed apprehension of something untoward happening in the wedding.
