Two widows have been bludgeoned to death by a man in the northern Indian state of Haryana, officials say. Police arrested a 23-year-old man, the nephew of one of the women. He was on parole, having served a sentence for rape.

Eyewitnesses told police he killed his aunt and another woman in full view of other villagers, after he accused them of being in a lesbian relationship.

Birbhum (Women's Feature Service) - Sixteen-year-old Sunita Murmu is quite the celeb in her locality these days. This teenager had the courage to approach the remote Mohammadbazar police station in Birbhum, one of West Bengal's most backward districts, and lodge a complaint against the powerful criminal elements from within her community. Of course, she did not stop there - young Sunita also ensured that these men were arrested for sexually harassing, torturing and ostracising her.

Nimera, Jaipur (Women's Feature Service) - Vimla Devi, 39, was preparing to go to bed when she heard loud bangs on her door. Her heart sank. At 9 p.m., everyone in Nimera village, 25 kilometres from the state capital of Jaipur, had already settled down for the night. Piercing the calm came the shouts of men wielding 'lathis' (sticks) and trying to break down Vimla's door: "We will kill this woman today," they shouted. Inside the house, Vimla and her two children shuddered with fear.

(New York) July 18, 2010 -- The Indian government should urgently investigate and prosecute those responsible for the recent spurt in reported "honor" killings, Human Rights Watch said today. The government should also strengthen laws that protect against kinship, religion-based, and caste-based violence, and take appropriate action against local leaders who endorse or tolerate such crimes, Human Rights Watch said.

Murders to protect family or community "honor" have increased in recent months, in the northern states of Haryana, Punjab, and Uttar Pradesh, where unofficial village councils, called khap panchayats, issue edicts condemning couples for marrying outside their caste or religion and condemn marriages within a kinship group (gotra), considered incestuous even though there is no biological connection. To enforce these decrees and break up such relationships, family members have threatened couples, filed false cases of abduction, and killed spouses to protect the family's "honor." Some local politicians and officials have been sympathetic to the councils' edicts, implicitly supporting the violence.

"Officials who fail to condemn village council edicts that end in murder are effectively endorsing murder," said Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director for Human Rights Watch. "Politicians and police need to send these councils a strong message to stop issuing edicts on marriages."