Outrage mounts in India over rape, murder – Nationalist lawmaker arrested

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NEW DELHI, India, April 14, (Agencies): India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday promised justice aft er nationwide outrage mounted over the brutal gang rape and murder of an eight-year-old-girl.

Demonstrations were held in New Delhi and other cities as horrific details emerged of the murder of the Muslim girl, who was repeatedly raped while being held for five days in the city of Kathua in Jammu, including at a Hindu temple

“Th e incidents being discussed for the last two days are definitely shameful for any civil society. We are all ashamed as a society and a country,” Modi said in a speech in New Delhi. “I want to assure the country that no criminal will be spared, justice will be done and completed.” Earlier, the country’s women’s minister called for the death penalty for child rapists in a video message posted online. “I have been deeply, deeply disturbed by the rape case in Kathua and all the recent rape cases that have happened on children,”

Maneka Gandhi, the women and children’s minister, said on Twitter. Gandhi said her ministry would seek an amendment to India’s Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, “asking for the death penalty for rape on children below 12 years”.

The Kathua killing has shaken India in a way reminiscent of the fatal gang rape of a Delhi student on a bus in 2012 that made headlines around the world. Rahul Gandhi, leader of the opposition Congress party, led a candlelight march late Thursday to the India Gate monument in Delhi — the site of mass protests aft er the 2012 attack — to highlight the “unimaginable brutality” of the latest killing. “Like millions of Indians my heart hurts,” Gandhi said at the midnight rally. “India simply cannot continue to treat its women the way it does.” Vikramaditya Singh, who joined protestors at India Gate later Friday, said deep reforms were needed to improve women’s rights in India.

“The women in this country are the victims of these crimes. Besides taking action in this case, we need to look at the … upbringing and education of men in our society,” Singh told AFP. Eight people have been arrested over the killing, including four police officers and a minor. All are Hindus.

The victim, whose identity was protected by a court order Friday, was murdered in January in the northern state of Jammu and Kashmir.

According to the charge sheet, she was abducted by the minor and an accomplice. The girl was forced to take sedatives and during five days in a shed and then a Hindu temple, she was repeatedly raped by the juvenile and different men, including a police constable. She was finally strangled and beaten with a stone.

According to the charge sheet, one of the attackers raped her just before she died. Jammu and Kashmir is India’s only Muslim- majority state, but the Jammu region in the south, where the rape and murder took place, is Hindu-dominated.

The case has heightened fears of communal tensions in the region. Muslim activists have demanded action against what they see as a crime against their community while some right-wing Hindu groups have argued that the accused were unfairly charged. This week, a crowd of Hindu lawyers tried to stop police from entering a court to file charges against the accused men.

A governing Hindu nationalist party lawmaker was arrested aft er being accused of abducting and raping a teenage girl last year, officials said. Kuldeep Singh Sengar denies the allegation. He was arrested Friday aft er questioning in Lucknow, the capital of northern Uttar Pradesh state, said Abhishek Dayal, a spokesman for the federal Central Bureau of Investigation.

The teen also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party of shielding the lawmaker and police of delaying his prosecution. Violent crimes against women have been on the rise in India despite tough laws enacted in 2013. In 2012, the fatal gang rape of a young woman in the heart of India’s capital prompted hundreds of thousands of Indians to take to the streets to demand stricter rape laws.

The outrage over the New Delhi attack spurred quick action on legislation doubling prison terms for rapists to 20 years and criminalizing voyeurism, stalking and the trafficking of women. Indian lawmakers also voted to lower to 16 from 18 the age at which a person can be tried as an adult for heinous crimes.

The Associated Press generally does not name people who say they are a victim of a sex crime. Th e girl told reporters Thursday that Sengar was known to her family because they were from the same village in Uttar Pradesh state.

She accused Sengar of raping her in June last year when she went to his home in Unnao district, 40 kms (25 miles) from Lucknow. Federal investigators said the teenager’s family also accused four other people of kidnapping and raping her.

Police are investigating the complaint. Th e girl said she protested to state authorities in August last year, but nothing happened. She and her family moved to New Delhi because they felt threatened by the lawmaker and his supporters and she sent petitions to India’s president, the prime minister and the state police chief seeking help.

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