Talking to The Indian Express, Manpreet said: ``Our only fault is that we belong to different castes; I am a Jat Sikh, he is a Rajput. My family wants me back at any cost and I believe they could go to any length.''

On March 9, fearing for her own and her husband's safety Manpreet petitioned the Punjab Human Rights Commission. Her husband has moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court seeking police protection.

Her parents, Parmjit Singh and Jasmail Kaur of village Lalle, district Ferozepur, claim that they only want to protect their daughter from ``a conspiracy to usurp money and property.''

In contrast to Balwinder's (taxi driver) family whose father is facing trial for smuggling poppy husk and whose uncle is a proclaimed offender, Manpreet's family is well off, with one of herbrothers settled in Canada.Denying that they ever threatened their daughter's life, Parmjit and Jasmail say: ``We oppose the marriage because she has been deluded and misled. Whatever we have done has only been to liberate her from the claws of Balwinder and his family.''

Manpreet knew there would be trouble over the marriage: ``The marriage took place at Gurdwara Shimpapuri in Ludhiana according to Sikh rites and Balwinder's parents accepted me from day one but I didn't tell my parents.''She says, ``When my family came to know of the marriage, they asked for negatives of photographs. They destroyed them thinking they had destroyed all proof of our marriage. They wanted to prove that the marriage was illegal.''

Manpreet says that she was often forcibly brought back from her in-laws' house at Nawanshahr. On one occasion, Manpreet says,``My father forced me to file a criminal complaint against Balwinder under Section 506 of the IPC in the court of Judicial Magistrate First Class. But as soon as I could fleeback to Balwinder, we went to the court and withdrew the complaint. Later, we came to know that on March 5, my father got an FIR registered against Balwinder and his family under Sections 366, 376 and 120-B of the IPC. The same day a police party came to our village looking for us. When they didn't find us they took away my mother-in-law and released her only in the evening.'' Manpreet's family denies getting false cases registered against Balwinder and instead accuse him of putting pressure on their daughter to lodge complaints against them.

Meanwhile, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has granted anticipatory bail to Balwinder. The couple is apprehensive but determined. ``My parents have wronged our love and all I pray for is that I stand by Balwinder for all times to come just as Balwinder has stood by me in my times of trial,'' Manpreet says.