New Delhi: Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra lashed out at the BJP after the body of a missing Dalit woman was found in a desolate canal in Uttar Pradesh’s Ayodhya, as they demanded strict action against the culprits and the police officers who have been accused of inaction.
An unclothed body of a 22-year-old Dalit woman, who was missing, was found in a desolate canal near her village in Uttar Pradesh’s Ayodhya, with her family alleging murder, police said on Saturday.
The family members claimed that her eyes were missing and that the body bore deep wounds and fractures.
The woman’s family has accused police of inaction, alleging that officers did not actively search for her despite the missing report.
In a post in Hindi on X, Rahul Gandhi said, “The inhumanity and brutal murder of a Dalit girl in Ayodhya is heartbreaking and very shameful. If the administration had paid heed to the cry for help of the girl’s family that had been echoing for three days, perhaps her life could have been saved.”
“Another daughter’s life has ended due to this heinous crime. For how long and how many families will have to cry and suffer like this? The anti-Bahujan BJP rule, especially in Uttar Pradesh, is resulting in rising the heinous atrocities, injustices and murders of Dalits,” Gandhi said.
The Uttar Pradesh government should immediately investigate this crime, get the culprits punished as severely as possible and take strict action against the responsible policemen, Gandhi said.
And please do not harass the victim’s family as usual, he added.
The daughters of the country and the entire Dalit community are looking towards you for justice, Gandhi said.
Priyanka Gandhi said the kind of barbarism that was done to a Dalit girl who had gone to listen to Bhagwat Katha in Ayodhya will send chills down the spine of any human being.
“Such cruel incidents shame the entire humanity. The girl was missing for three days but the police did nothing. In BJP’s Jungle Raj, no one is there to listen to the cries of Dalits, tribals, backward and poor. The UP government has become synonymous with atrocities on Dalits,” she said.
“I demand that strict action be taken against the culprits who committed the atrocities as well as the responsible policemen and officers,” Priyanka Gandhi said.
According to the family, the woman had been missing since Thursday night. They launched a search and her brother-in-law found her body in a small canal, 500 metres away from the village on Saturday morning, police said.
Her limbs were tied with ropes, and her body had multiple deep cuts, they claimed. Villagers who draped and transported the body noticed a fractured leg, while her elder sister and two women collapsed upon witnessing the horrific condition of the body.
Circle Officer Ashutosh Tiwari said that after receiving a complaint on Friday, police registered a missing report. Police have launched an investigation, and efforts are underway to identify those responsible.
