Jhajjar (Haryana), Aug 9 - A 'sarv khap panchayat' (grand caste council) in Haryana's Jhajjar district has reduced the 'punishment' of a family, who had been ordered to leave the village after one of its members married in violation of 'traditional norms'. Now only the married couple has been debarred from entering the village for life.

The Gehlout family was asked to leave its village Dharana after Ravinder Singh Gehlout, 24, married 20-year-old Shilpa of the Kadiyan clan. A khap panchayat (caste council) accused him of violating a custom of holding no marriages between the Gehlout and Kadiyan clans, which are said to have a 'brotherhood' akin to consanguinity.

Gehlout's family was ordered to leave the village and sell its property.

The 'sarv khap', the grand council, held at the district's Beri town, 20 km from here, ordered the lifelong ouster of Ravinder Singh Gehlout and his wife from the village, and also told his father to remain out of the village for a three-month period.