Anti-rape protesters staged fresh rallies on Sunday sparked by the brutal rape of an abducted five-year-old Indian girl in New Delhi, as doctors said the victim was showing signs of “improvement”.
A team of doctors at New Delhi’s top government hospital are treating the child and officials said she was in “stable condition”.
The attack on the five-year-old and the following public revulsion was reminiscent of the horrifying gang-rape of a 23-year-old student on a bus last December, who died from her injuries.
That case led to weeks of protests and a national debate over the status of women in India, putting the spotlight on the high incidence of sexual violence.
The five-year-old victim was being treated for serious internal injuries sustained during a more than 40-hour ordeal, allegedly at the hands of a garment worker who was arrested on Saturday on suspicion of carrying out the attack.
“She is in stable condition and showing signs of improvement,” hospital medical superintendent DK Sharma said.
“She is conscious and talking to her parents, doctors and nurses and it can be said there is no danger to her life now,” he added.
Later, speaking with reporters Sharma said the child had been gravely injured.
But “she is perhaps too young to understand the gravity of the situation”, he added.
India’s prime minister on Sunday reminded officials of the protests in the wake of the gang-rape in December and the latest attack and urged them to address growing concerns over the “safety, security and status of women” in India.
“The gruesome assault on a little child a few days back reminds us of the need to work collectively to root out this sort of depravity from our society,” Manmohan Singh said.
“The agitations that have followed the two incidents also point to the need for showing concern and sensitivity while dealing with the public anxiety that such incidents generate,” Singh said.
The premier said his government toughened an anti-rape law after the attack in December on the female student by six men in a bus.
She died some two weeks later of internal injuries.
“Our government has moved with speed in strengthening the law to be able to deal more effectively with offences against women.”
Newspapers highlighted the rape of the child on their front pages for the second day on Sunday.
“Seething Delhi erupts in protests,” Sunday Pioneer said in a headline.
Demonstrators carrying flags and posters reached the city’s main police headquarters to protest.
Another group of protesters were outside the hospital where she is under round-the-clock observation, witnesses said.
The 22-year-old suspect, Manoj Kumar, described by media reports as a tenant in the child’s house, was apprehended after he fled to his in-laws’ home in the eastern state of Bihar.
The Hindustan Times reported, that the arrested accused told police that another man was also involved in the crime with him. The police are still to verify his claims, the report added.
Police accused Kumar of repeatedly attacking the child inside a locked room after kidnapping her Monday in a lower middle-class area of New Delhi.
Some one asked the rapist, why 5 year old girl, he said wanted to create world record, since Indians are lacking behind in world records.
Seriously indians – get a grip on yourself. Now a 5 yr old?? I was at a party in the US with my sister and friends a few years ago dancing – this idiot drunk moron indian told me outside that he was "the king of this city". I laughed. Then when me, my sister and friends were all dancing, he came behind her and tried to hump her – she ran behind me. I swear if it wasn't my friend's party and club, I would have ended him there. Indians are brought up to be rapists with zero respect for women.
Comments are closed.