A 14-year-old Dalit rape victim who was repeatedly sexually assaulted and was forced to drink a corrosive substance, died at a hospital here on Sunday, prompting an anguished DCW chief to lash out at the Centre and Delhi police on the issue of women’s safety. “How many Nirbhayas does Delhi wantIJ We all simply wait for next Nirbhaya to die,” the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) Chairperson Swati Maliwal said on Twitter, adding she “never felt so helpless.”
She asked the Centre to set up a high-level ministerial committee on women safety under the leadership of Home Minister Rajnath Singh. “With parents of 14-year-old victim. V poor n inconsolable. To add insult to injury, Home Ministry scrapped Women Safety Sp Task Force in Delhi set up wen Nirbhaya died stating its mandate finished! She is dead! We the system is responsible. Never felt so helpless. Need to do something. Come on people ...(sic),” Maliwal said in a series of tweets.
Maliwal was alluding to the Centre’s recent decision to disband the Special Task Force on women’s safety in Delhi. It was established in 2013 in the aftermath of the brutal Nirbhaya gangrape. On Friday, the DCW has issued a notice to DCP (North) questioning the handling of the case of the Dalit minor who was allegedly kidnapped by the accused just before a hearing in her rape case, subjected to sexual assault several times and forced to drink corrosive substance.
In the notice, the Commission had directed DCP (North) to provide security to the girl and her family and asked why the police had not arrested the accused till date. The Commission had also sought the details of action taken on the complaint of the victim’s parents regarding threat to their lives in an FIR filed on May 15 and asked the reasons for not registering offences under Section 3 of the SC and ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.
Giving details of the case, the Commission in its notice had said, an FIR under sections 363, 376 IPC and 4/6 of POCSO Act was registered in Burari police station on December 2 last year against a main accused Shivshankar.
According to the FIR in May, just before a hearing in the court, the girl was kidnapped from her house following which, on May 19, another FIR was registered.
The DCW said the victim was recovered between May 26-27 and her parents were called to Burari police station to meet her where they found their daughter bleeding profusely from the head. The victim has alleged she was kidnapped by the maternal aunt of the main accused and during confinement she was raped several times a day by Shivshankar. Her hands and feet were tied and was refused any food during the period. The victim has alleged Shivshankar along with his maternal aunt and uncle had fed the girl a corrosive substance mixed in a soft drink...”