A seven-year-old girl has reportedly been gang-raped by two boys aged seven and eight in the latest horrific sexual attack in India.
The youths are accused of raping the girl in the town of Ballia in Uttar Pradesh on Friday, local media reported.
The victim’s family said the girl was bathing when the boys took her to another place where they gang-raped her.
Police added that the seven-year-old girl was taken to hospital by her family when her condition deteriorated on Saturday. Her condition is not considered to be life-threatening.
Both boys were arrested and questioned, and reportedly admitted to the gang rape.
The horrific rape comes just a month after thousands of women took to the streets of India to demand action to tackle sexual violence, after a junior doctor was savagely raped and murdered at a state hospital in Kolkata.
Thousands of women took to the streets of India in August to demand action to address sexual violence
The boys are accused of raping the girl in the town of Ballia in Uttar Pradesh on Friday, local media reported.
The largest event, described as a ‘Reclaim The Night’ march, saw thousands of protesters gather at the city’s busy Shyambazar five-point junction at the start of the country’s Independence Day celebrations on August 14.
Smaller protests were held in other Indian cities including Delhi, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Pune.
The largest event, described as a ‘Reclaim The Night’ march, brought together thousands of protesters at the city’s busy Shyambazar five-point junction at the start of the country’s Independence Day celebrations in August.
The event’s main organiser, social science researcher Rimjhim Sinha, 29, said she hoped the protest would mark the start of structural change in the country, which has long been plagued by gender-based violence.
The gruesome crime that triggered the nationwide protest was that of a 31-year-old junior doctor from RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, who was raped and murdered while on duty, resting in a seminar room that was supposed to be safe.
Officials, including the medical college’s principal, Dr Sandip Ghosh, have tried to rule out the girl’s death as suicide.
Ghosh, who later resigned from his prestigious post, said: “It was irresponsible for the girl to go alone to the seminary hall at night.”
A volunteer hospital worker associated with the Kolkata police, locally named Sanjay Roy, has since been arrested in connection with the attack on the patient.
The murder and rape case has since been taken over by the country’s Central Bureau of Investigation amid allegations that the local force would not investigate it fairly.
Sinha said: “The brutality of this case is outrageous. This is not just another rape case where survivors can speak for themselves – this time, we have lost a life.
“The aggressiveness of these crimes is increasing and it is clear that women are increasingly becoming victims of these criminal activities.”
