Lucknow/Unnao: Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra blamed Saturday the BJP government in Uttar Pradesh for the death of the Unnao rape victim. She also met the deceased’s family members at their house and offered her condolences.
Hours after the death of the 23-year-old gangrape victim at a Delhi hospital, the Congress leader alleged that the ‘hollow law and order mechanism in UP’ denied justice to survivors of sexual violations.
Priyanka Gandhi said the UP government did not provide security to the gangrape victim even though a similar incident had earlier taken place in the same district. She was referring to another alleged attack in Unnao district in July when the car in which a woman, who had accused BJP MLA Kuldeep Sengar of raping her, was hit by a truck. Two of the woman’s relatives were killed while she suffered serious injuries and is currently hospitalised.
In a tweet, Priyanka Gandhi said: “Why the victim of Unnao gangrape case was not given security keeping in mind an earlier incident of Unnao? What action has been taken on the police official who refused to register an FIR? What steps are being taken by the government to stop crime against the women, which take place on a daily basis?”
In another tweet she said: “I pray to God to give courage to the family members of Unnao victim.” She went on to say that it was due to everyone’s collective failure as a society that the victim was not able to get justice.
“At the social level, we all are guilty, but at the same time, this also points out to the hollow law and order mechanism in UP,” Priyanka Gandhi said in another tweet.
A number of senior UP Congress leaders were present with her during the meeting at the home of the victim’s family. A huge crowd of villagers had gathered outside the house.
The rape victim succumbed to severe burns in Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital late Friday night and the body is being taken to her village in Unnao district by road, her family said.
The woman was set ablaze allegedly by five persons, including two men accused of raping her, and had suffered 90 per cent burns. She was airlifted to the Delhi hospital from Lucknow.
It should be stated here that earlier in the day Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had said that a fast-track court will be set up to decide the case.
PTI
