Protests in Kolkata after college girl is gangraped, beaten up and killed

Despite protests, arrests and stricter laws, rape is a horror that keeps stalking all corners of the country. The latest in the string of brutal sexual assaults on Indian women is the rape and murder of a 20-year-old college student in Kolkata. The college-going girl was abducted while returning home after writing an exam and was raped by five people, beaten up and then strangled. Some regional media reports claim that she was assaulted so brutally that both her legs were fractured. [caption id=“attachment_865259” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Protests against rape in Delhi. Agencies.[/caption] According to a Times of India report, the attack was orchestrated by Ali, the caretaker of a godown in the Rajarhat-Aminpur border area, on the eastern fringes of Kolkata on Friday. Ali and four accomplices Nurul Islam, Sk Amin, Saiful Mollah and Gopal Das, kept drinking inside the premises of the godown and waited for a woman to turn up alone. The Telegraph reports that the accused have confessed to having plotted to rape any woman they could lay their hands on. They kept a watch on all women passing by the godown. They let go of one woman with her husband, they contemplated attacking a group of three girls but then found it too risky, and finally when the victim came along, they grabbed and gagged her before dragging her into the premises. TOI reports:

She was found at that spot, legs splayed and naked, by local residents around 9pm on Friday evening. She was last spotted alighting a bus at the Kamdoni crossing around six hours earlier. “I spoke to her at 2.20pm when she left New Town Girls High School after the exam. Locals had seen her get off a bus. It was raining then. She then took the road that leads to our house around 1.5km away. When she failed to turn up, we called her repeatedly but without success,” said the victim’s elder brother.

After the victim’s body was recovered late in the evening, locals broke out in protest and the RAF had to be summoned to bring the situation under control. The prime accused, Ali, was allegedly  a Trinamool Congress activist and the locals demanded exemplary action against him. While protests continued across Barasat, chief minister Mamata Banerjee also felt the heat. A rights group demanding immediate action organised a dharna in front of the secretariat office in the Writers’ Buildings, the government’s headquarters in Kolkata. Hindustan Times reports:

In another development, lawyers at Barasat court have decided not to represent any of the eight persons arrested for the gruesome rape and murder of the girl. A team of Barasat Court Bar Association, too, staged a protest outside the court premises and later visited the rape’s victim house.

While CM Mamata Banerjee is yet to comment on the incident, the victim’s family has made it clear that they don’t want compensation or a government job, they will only settle for strict punishment against the accused.