Twitter
Advertisement

Muzaffarnagar gang-rape: Amnesty report details struggles of 7 Muslim women who pressed charges

The Muzaffarnagar cases are the first in which section 376 (2) (g) of the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2013 has been applied. Under the amended act, rape committed during communal or sectarian violence will invite a punishment of not lesser than ten years of rigorous imprisonment.

Latest News
article-main
FacebookTwitterWhatsappLinkedin

On September 8, 2013, a day after a massive gathering in a village outside Muzaffarnagar city in which Hindu leaders from the dominant Jat community addressed a crowd of over 1,00,000 people to save their Hindu daughters and ‘bahus’ from love jihad, 42-year-old Fatima was sexually violated by four men. The men, who belonged to the Jat community and were known to her, assaulted her in her own house in Fugana. 

Yet, when she went to the local police station on September 20 to file an FIR, the police refused to do so. It was on October 9, 2013, when she went to file an FIR for the second time, after she was displaced from her own home, that the police eventually registered an FIR. In August 2014, after the police had filed charges against the accused men, two of the accused told other villagers to pass on a message to her family that they would be killed if she did not withdraw her accusation.  

She filed a complaint in August 2014, alleging that the accused lured her with money -- if she complied, they would pay her Rs 15 lakh, and if she does not, she and her family will be killed. 

Fatima is one of the seven courageous women who came forward to lodge a complaint in the aftermath of the violence, during which several women were allegedly violated. Intermittent delays and intimidation has marred the investigation. 

Fatima’s account forms the leitmotif of the aftermath of the violence that left over 60 people dead, over 200 injured and several women sexually violated. In the three years since the violence erupted, there has not been a single conviction. A report, “Losing Faith: The Muzaffarnagar Gang-rape Survivors’ Struggle for Justice”, released by Amnesty India in Delhi on Thursday, details the cases of seven Muslim women who came forward to press charges. 

“Despite changes to India’s laws in 2013 requiring trials in rape cases to be completed without unnecessary delay, trials have proceeded extremely slowly. The state government and successive central governments have also failed to adequately protect the survivors from threats and harassment — which in some cases led to them retracting their statements — and to provide adequate reparation,” read a statement from Amnesty International India. 

Even FIRs in the cases were filed as late as February 2014 with the intervention of the Supreme Court after advocate Vrinda Grover submitted a writ petition in the matter. In one case, chargesheet has not been filed yet, and in another, the survivor recanted her statement after continued harassment, stated the report. In two of the cases, charges are not yet framed, while in one, the accused were acquitted. Trial is yet to begin in a case, while in another, a petition seeking the transfer of the case out of Muzaffarnagar was filed in April 2016. 

In March 2014, the Supreme Court directed the Uttar Pradesh government to give each of the survivors Rs 5,00,000 as compensation, in addition to other benefits, within four weeks. Six of the seven survivors received the compensation on May 20, 2014, eight weeks after the Supreme Court ruling, after repeated requests. 

Makepeace Sitlhou, part of the Amnesty International India’s team sent to report on the investigation, said that there has been a “deliberate delay”. “In one case, the investigating officer took a complainant and paraded her in a marketplace of shops owned by Jat men as part of investigation,” she said. After a complaint with the National Commission of Minorities, the officer was removed. 

She added that there has been little assistance of the survivors, with many of them even having to cook for the constables that guard them. After their displacement, a lot of the women have been pushed to ghettoised colonies in the area, she said. 

Activist Rehana Adeeb said that rights workers work under severe pressure to get the women to speak. “There’s pressure from the authorities, from the accused, and even from the Muslim communities,” she said. 

Advocate Vrinda Grover, who has been spearheading the legal fight to deliver justice to the victims, recounted several accounts of mischief on part of the accused and their counsels to delay the investigation. In one case, one of the survivors told the court that she does not remember the accused. “This is after she had named the accused in the FIR; she bucked under the continued delay and the absences of any support,” said Grover.

Grover said that the Muzaffarnagar cases were the first in which section 376 (2) (g) of the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2013 were applied. Under the amended act, rape committed during communal or sectarian violence will invite a punishment of not lesser than ten years of rigorous imprisonment. The charges were not applied in the original FIRs, leaving a window for the argument around consent, she said. 

Arrangement for in-camera recording of rape testimonies was missing from the proceedings, added Grover. “This is also the first instance in my career where I had to request for police protection for my own self,” she said. 

As part of its recommendations, Amnesty International India has demanded a vigorous pursuance of the cases to bring justice to the women, an investigation into the threats or harassment of survivors, provision for effective legal assistance and rehabilitation. They have also recommended for a robust law to respond to communal violence, an adequately resourced victim and witness protection programme and comprehensive police reforms.

A second report on the rehabilitation of the survivors will be released in the coming weeks, said Amnesty.  

Find your daily dose of news & explainers in your WhatsApp. Stay updated, Stay informed-  Follow DNA on WhatsApp.
Advertisement

Live tv

Advertisement
Advertisement