Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi on Saturday left for Hathras to meet the family of the 20-year-old woman whose rape, murder and forcible cremation has triggered widespread protests across India. This is the Gandhis’ second attempt to meet the bereaved family. Their first attempt on Thursday ended with a scuffle with the police and brief detention. A repeat is likely today given the heavy police deployment on the Delhi-Uttar Pradesh border. Barricades have been installed at the Delhi-Noida Direct (DND) flyway even as CrPC section 144 remains imposed in UP’s Gautam Buddh Nagar. Congress MP Shashi Tharoor also posted a picture of him driving a car and said he was headed to Hathras, about 180 km from the national capital.
There was heavy police deployment on the Delhi-Uttar Pradesh border with barricades on Delhi-Noida Direct (DND) flyway and scores of policemen deployed. "Congress MPs under the leadership of former Congress president Rahul Gandhi will go to Hathras today afternoon to meet the grieving family of the 19-year old-daughter of Uttar Pradesh, who was brutally assaulted & murdered," Congress general secretary (organisation) K C Venugopal tweeted.
On Thursday, Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi along with several party leaders and workers were detained by the police and sent back to Delhi, after they tried to reach Hathras to meet the family of the Dalit woman. In a tweet in Hindi using the hashtag 'Hathrashorror', Rahul Gandhi said the behaviour of the UP government and police with the woman and her family "is unacceptable to me. No Indian should accept this." Rahul Gandhi asserted that "no power in the world can stop me from meeting this grieving family in Hathras and share their pain".
Hitting out at the Yogi Adityanath dispensation, Priyanka Gandhi said the UP government is "morally corrupt". "The victim did not get treatment, her complaint was not registered on time, her body was forcibly cremated, the family is in captivity, they are being suppressed — now they are being threatened that they will have to undergo a narco test," she said in a tweet in Hindi.
"This behaviour is not acceptable to the country. Stop threatening the victim's family," she said. The party alleged that the woman and her family have been denied justice and "severely traumatised" by the BJP government in their attempt to hide the truth of the heinous crime perpetrated on her.
The Dalit woman was allegedly raped at a village in Hathras by four upper caste men on September 14. After her condition deteriorated, she was referred to the Delhi's Safdarjung Hospital where she breathed her last on Tuesday. She was cremated in the early hours of Wednesday, with her family alleging the local police forced them to conduct the last rites in the dead of the night.
Local police officers, however, had said the cremation was carried out "as per the wishes of the family".
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