Unnao Rape Survivor, Mother Dragged From Delhi Protest
New Delhi : After the Unnao rape survivor and her family were forcibly removed from a protest at Delhi’s Red Gate against the suspended sentence of convict and former BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar, Uttar Pradesh minister OP Rajbhar on Wednesday. I wanted to kill myself then and there, but I stopped after thinking about my family, the survivor said on Tuesday evening after she and her mother were forcibly dragged out of the lawns of India Gate while protesting a Delhi High Court order granting bail to Sengar in the 2017 rape case.
The Delhi High Court on Tuesday suspended the sentence of Sengar, who is serving life imprisonment for the 2017 kidnapping and rape case, and ordered his release on bail pending the outcome of his appeal against a 2019 conviction in a lower court. The court directed that Sengar must not come within a 5-kilometre radius of the victim’s residence or threaten the survivor or her mother. Any violation of these conditions would result in automatic cancellation of bail, the court stated.
Sengar will remain in jail due to a separate 10-year sentence in connection with a separate case and has not been granted bail in that case. Reacting to the verdict, the survivor, who was a minor at the time of the crime, stated that security for her family members, lawyers and witnesses had already been withdrawn and the court’s decision had deepened her fears.
Journalists had asked why the police picked up the rape survivor and those accompanying her from India Gate. In response, Rajbhar said that their home was in Unnao and then burst into laughter. Reactiong sharply to Rajbhar’s comment, an user wrote, “Seeing Om Prakash Rajbhar’s shamelessness, it feels like this person isn’t even worthy of being called human; these people have turned a daughter’s rape into a mere joke .”
