JOINT PRESS STATEMENT FROM NATIONAL WOMEN’S ORGANISATIONS
Women condemn Baduan rape and murder, demand immediate arrest of main culprit
Women's organisations strongly condemns the 3rd January incident of gang-rape, torture and murder of an anganwadi worker by a mahant and his henchmen in Badaun, Uttar Pradesh. The woman sometimes used to visit the temple presided over by the main culprit and when she did not return, her family started looking for her. The mangled body of the woman was brought back in a car and left in front of her home. In a repeat of the callousness evidenced in the Hathras case, the police ignored the pleas of the family to lodge the FIR. They turned up only the next morning and after the post mortem revealed severe injuries including injuries in the private parts of the victim' s body. The main culprit has absconded although his two associates have been arrested. The SSP, Badaun has stated that the Thana IC has been temporarily relieved of his duties, but keeping earlier such cases in mind we very much suspect that there will be efforts to sideline the rape and murder and to subvert justice to cover up the atrocious records of the Jogi Government. It is shameful that such horrendous crimes against women are being committed at a time when the UP government is preventing women by police force from holding peaceful demonstrations with their just demands for food and work. It is doubly shameful that in a regime that boasts of religiosity, temples are becoming sites of crimes and mahants are becoming perpetrators. We demand immediate apprehension of the main culprit, protection for the family and proper police and administrative action to ensure speedy justice. We also call upon all our activists in the states to campaign strongly on the issue to expose the dangers that women face under BJP regime.
ALL INDIA DEMOCRATIC WOMEN’S ASSOCIATION (AIDWA)
NATIONAL FEDERATION OF INDIAN WOMEN (NFIW)
ALL INDIA PROGRESSIVE WOMEN’S ASSOCIATION (AIPWA)
PRAGATISHEEL MAHILA SANGHATAN (PMS)
ALL INDIA MAHILA SANSKRITIK SANGHATAN (AIMSS)
ALL INDIA AGRAGAMI MAHILA SAMITI (AIAMS)
