India’s shame: More violence against women

NEW DELHI - Two gangrapes, including one in the heart of the national capital, an attempt to rape an 11-year-old girl, a raped teen commits suicide in Uttar Pradesh, another lies disfigured in a brutal attack for resisting rape, a young woman in Kerala dies after being flung off a moving train and raped on the tracks….all this speaks of the continuing violence against women.

In the latest incident, a Class 11 student of a south Delhi school was gang raped by her neighbour and two of his friends near Bhikaji Cama Place last week. The three youths have been arrested.

The 16-year-old girl, who belongs to Kerala, was raped by the three youths on Feb 2.

She fell for the stylish life of her neighbour and his snazzy bike, and went out for lunch with him. He cajoled her into spending some time with him, called two of his friends over and gangraped the girl. The frightened girl told her parents only the next day, after which they filed a complaint.

In another gangrape, that took place Saturday night, a girl who went to meet a youth she had befriended on the internet for the first time was gangraped in Ghaziabad by five youths. The youths have been arrested, but the young woman was too scared to come forward and complain. The complaint was filed by her boyfriend.

In a Monday morning incident, an 11-year-old girl who went for a run in a park in Delhi alongwith her 10-year-old brother would almost have been raped by a guard and a cleaner in the park had not her parents come searching for the kids. The siblings, who hail from Shimla, had gone to a park in Vikaspuri area when they were accosted by the two men. When their waiting parents did not see them come out of the exit gate they went to search for them and found the two men trying to take off the girl’s clothes.

In Jhansi, Uttar Pradesh, a 17-year-old girl set herself on fire here after allegedly being raped on Saturday by a youth. She died Monday in a hospital of 10 percent burns.

The girl, a native of Mauranipur town, was allegedly raped Saturday by a youth, while she had gone to work in the fields. The youth was later arrested.

In Kanpur, a 17-year-old Dalit girl lay in hospital under deep sedation recovering from the deep gashes on her face and one ear partly chopped off - revenge attacks on her by three men of her native village, Udauli, in Fatehpur district, for resisting their rape attempt. The main accused has been arrested.

Congress MP Rahul Gandhi visited the girl in hospital and another 17-year-old Dalit girls in Banda who was allegedly raped and kept in captivity by Bahujan Samaj Party legislator Purushottam Naresh Dwivedi and his henchmen.

Dwivedi, who is now behind bars, had got her jailed on false theft charges.

Gandhi spent 15-20 minutes with the girl, who was released from jail last month on Chief Minister Mayawati’s intervention and who has said she wants to kill the BSP legislator “with my own hands”.

He later visited another rape victim, in Sultanpur district. The woman lay in hospital and told the Congress MP she was gangraped on Jan 31 and the culprits were still at large.

In Shornur in Kerala, it was the funeral of Soumya, 23, the young woman who was pushed off a train by a thief and then raped as she lay severely injured on the railway tracks.

Soumya was the sole breadwinner of her family.

Soumya died Sunday evening after battling for life since Tuesday last when she was thrown out from a moving train by a proclaimed thief, who first smashed her head with a stone and then raped her.

She was on her way home from work as a marriage proposal for her was being discussed.

Soumya was working in an office at Kochi and was returning by the Ernakulam-Shornur passenger train when the thief accosted her in the women’s compartment which did not have any police guard.

Later, she was found in an unconscious state near the track at Vettikkattiri near Cheruthururthy at 9.30 p.m., after the guard informed the Railway Police that he had seen someone fall off the moving train.

Soumya was on ventilator with a fractured skull and bleeding in the brain. She died Sunday evening.

Cut to Mandsaur in Madhya Pradesh, where a minor girl who alleged that she was raped by a legislator’s nephew last year went on a hunger strike demanding justice.

The 16-year-old girl alleged rape by Dhanmendra, a nephew of ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator Yashpal Sisodia. She is sitting on a hunger strike since Sunday at Azad Chowk of Mandsaur district, over 350 km from Bhopal.

Sisodia has refuted the charges.