Delhi gang-rape: Covicts' lawyer urges parents to burn their daughters alive if they have premarital sex

The Indian lawyer for two of the four Delhi gang rapists sentenced to hang last week has criticised the victim's parents for allowing her to go out at night with a boy, and claimed he would have "burnt her alive" if she had been his daughter.

The victim, a 23-year-old paramedical student, was attacked by five men and a juvenile on a bus she boarded with her boyfriend. The couple were on their way home from a popular Delhi shopping mall on December 16 last year. She was gang-raped and attacked with an iron rod. She died two weeks later in hospital.

The brutality of the attack provoked nationwide demonstrations and a debate on the scale of sexual violence against women in India. The victim, a dedicated student and dutiful daughter who wanted to help lift her family out of poverty, had symbolised millions of young women's determination to achieve equal rights in India.

AP Singh, a defence lawyer who represented two of the convicts, Vinay Sharma and Akshay Thakur, claimed she had had premarital sex and said: "If my daughter was having premarital sex and moving around at night with her boyfriend, I would have burnt her alive. All parents should adopt such an attitude."

Ranjana Kumari, a women's rights campaigner, said that his views were "Taliban-like". She added: "He should be arrested and his licence to practice in court should be withdrawn."