2012 Delhi rape victim's mother advocates death penalty for rapists, says society has progressed but 'daughters' still not safe

New Delhi: Parents of Jyoti Singh Pandey, the paramedic student who was raped and murdered in 2012, on Saturday advocated death penalty for rapists and said that though society had progressed, “our daughters are not safe”. The 23-year-old student was brutally gangraped in a moving bus in the national capital on 16 December, 2012, and a fortnight later, on 29 December, she succumbed in a Singapore hospital. “I feel very sad that we have progressed as a society a lot, but still our daughters are not safe today. I demand rapists should be hanged,” Jyoti’s mother said at the venue of Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) chief Swati Maliwal’s indefinite hunger strike, which entered its second day on Saturday. [caption id=“attachment_2550420” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Jyoti Singh Pandey’s parents. PTI[/caption] The strike by Maliwal comes in wake of the recent incidents of rape in Kathua in Jammu and Kashmir and Unnao in Uttar Pradesh. The DCW chief continued her strike at Samta Sthal (Rajghat) demanding the government take concrete actions to curb sexual crimes against women. “I am working with Swatiji for a long time and I support her ‘anshan’ (hunger strike) and all demands,” Jyoti’s mother said. In a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday, Maliwal had said, “Prime minister did fast for one day. We were hoping that he will speak something on the issue and will give assurance to the countrymen to ensure safety of our daughters. But, the silence of the PM and the entire government is very heart-breaking.” The DCW chief had said this before beginning the strike. In his first comments on the gruesome incidents in Unnao and Kathua, Modi had on Friday called them a “shame” for the country and asserted that the guilty will not be spared and our daughters will get justice. MLAs Vandana Kumari and Alka Lamba also reached the venue and expressed their support for the strike. They advocated strong anti-rape laws. HN Sharma, political adviser to former prime minister Chandra Shekhar, also attended the strike. Maliwal reiterated that she will not break her indefinite fast until the prime minister assures the nation of a better system to ensure security of women. She said these incidents were not happening only from the past two days. “Daily thousands of girls become ‘Nirbhaya’ in our country,” Maliwal said. The prime minister should tell the nation when he will provide a system in which the police’s accountability is fixed and enough fast-track courts are available to ensure punishment to accused within six months, she said. In Kathua, an eight-year-old girl from the nomadic Bakerwal community had gone missing from near her house on 10 January and a week later, her body was found in the same area. In the Unnao case, a 17-year-old girl has alleged that she was raped by Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar at his residence on 4 June, 2017. Click here for LIVE updates on the Kathua rape and murder case