Uttar Pradesh witnessed a horrific incident after the news of rape and murder of a 13-year-old girl at Lakhimpur Kheri district broke out on Saturday. Two men have been arrested in the case and the investigation is still underway.
According to a report, the minor's body was found in a sugarcane field on Saturday. She had been strangled, her eyes were gouged out and her tongue cut, the girl's father said. The incident took place on Friday, around 130 km from Lucknow, in a village close to the Nepal border. Her body was found in the fields of one of the accused.
The District Police Chief said that the girl's post mortem had confirmed rape and that the two accused were already arrested, the report stated. Charges for rape, murder, and the National Security Act will be filed, they added.
The victim had gone missing on Friday afternoon, and the father said that they had tried looking for her everywhere. Eventually, he said, she was found in a sugarcane field with her eyes gouged out. He added that her tongue was cut out and she was strangled with a dupatta.
However, Satyendra Kumar, SP, Lakhimpur Kher said that the claims about the eyes being gouged out and tongue being purposely slit were false. He said there was some blood near the victims' eye at the time the body was discovered, but that it could have happened due to a cut from the sharp leaves in the sugarcane field. He added that in cases of strangulation, the victim's tongue is often caught between the teeth. Kher said the post mortem report of the girl, whose body was found in a field in Isanagar, confirmed that she had been raped.
Political uproar over 13-yr-old girl's death
Former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati condemned the incident on Twitter calling it "extremely shameful". "What is the difference between the governments of the Samajwadi Party and the present BJP if such incidents keep happening?" she said, attacking the Yogi Adityanath administration.
Azad Samaj Party leader Chandrashekhar Azaad also spoke against the incident, saying that Dalit oppression was at the peak during the term of the BJP government and demanded the resignation of the Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath. "A Dalit minor was brutally murdered after rape in Pakariya village of Lakhimpur Kheri. If this is not Jungle Raj, then what is? Our daughters are not safe, our homes are not safe, there is an atmosphere of fear everywhere. Yogi resign."
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Akhilesh Yadav also expressed his outrage over the incident. "The ruthless killing after the rape of a teenager in Lakhimpur Kheri, UP, is shocking to humanity. During the BJP's term, harassment of girls and women of Uttar Pradesh is at its peak. Why is the BJP government becoming complicit in rape, kidnapping, crime, and killings?," he said, while adding "no more BJP".
Last week, a 6-year-old girl in western Uttar Pradesh's Hapur, less than 100 km from Delhi, was kidnapped and raped. The police arrested the accused on Friday. The girl remains at a hospital and has been through at least one surgery. Doctors say she is stable but not out of danger.