Haryana police on Wednesday formed a Special Investigation Team to probe the alleged gang rape of a 21-year-old Dalit woman in Rohtak. The SIT will submit its report within 90 days.
Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order) Mohammad Akil, who paid a visit to the victim in a Rohtak hospital on Wednesday, ordered setting up of the SIT.
Stating this, state Health Minister Anil Vij told reporters on the sidelines of a state cabinet meeting in Chandigarh that the SIT will have two deputy superintendents of police as members.
“As part of the investigations, the DNA samples of the complainant and the accused will also be matched. I can assure you of a fair probe. Whosoever has done any wrong will have to face the law,” he said, adding that the SIT has been asked to submit its report within 90 days.
The victim, a college student, was allegedly gang-raped by five persons in Rohtak district on July 13. This is said to be a repeat offence on her with two of the offenders also named as accused in the first case of gang rape in Bhiwani three years ago, Director General of Police K P Singh told reporters in Chandigarh on Tuesday.
The two repeat offenders were out on bail. The incident had also echoed in Lok Sabha on Tuesday.
Vij said the Bharatiya Janata Party government is sensitive towards cases of crime against women. “We try to act swiftly whenever such cases come to light,” he said.
The three accused who were arrested in connection with the case on Tuesday were on Wednesday remanded to four-day police custody by a Rohtak court.
Meanwhile, Opposition Congress slammed the BJP government in Haryana, alleging that women were feeling unsafe in the state.
“Even as a Dalit girl, raped again by the same culprits within three years, struggles to fight the trauma, the insensitivity of the police and administration in Rohtak, the countless number of such incidents which keep happening every other day, have made women feel unsafe in Haryana,” alleged Kiran Choudhry, Leader of Haryana Congress Legislature Party.
She slammed the Manohar Lal Khattar government in the state for the deteriorating law and-order situation, especially crimes against women, and demanded immediate steps to bring to book the remaining two accused in the case.
‘The Dalit girl’s rape by the same rapists who were out on bail shows the BJP government’s insensitivity, exposes its tall claims on law-and-order and raises two pertinent questions -- why did the state not oppose their bail and since they were granted bail, why the victim and her family, who had shifted to Rohtak, were not given adequate police protection,’ she said in a statement.
IMAGE: The three accused in Rohtak gang rape case being taken to a court on Wednesday. Photograph: PTI Photo
