UP police should have been more sensitive: BJP MP on Hathras case

UP Police needed to be "more sensitive and responsible" as their actions triggered anger among people following the cremation of the Hathras Dalit woman in dead of night, Kirit Solanki said

UP Police needed to be "more sensitive and responsible" as their actions triggered anger among people following the cremation of the Hathras Dalit woman in dead of night, head of the parliamentary panel on the welfare of SCs/STs and BJP MP Kirit Solanki said on Thursday.

Calling the Hathras case "unfortunate," Solanki said he strongly condemns the incident and the guilty should be hanged if the rape charge is proven.

"Stringent punishment should be awarded to those who found guilty for this heinous crime. And if gang-rape is proven, they should be hanged as per the law," Solanki told PTI over the phone.

Solanki, Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Welfare of Schedule Castes and Schedule Tribes, said, "The panel will take serious cognisance of this incident and will discuss with the panel members how to take up this issue."

A senior UP Police officer, however, said the forensic report has revealed that the 19-year-old was not raped.

Talking about the incident, Solanki said, "As per media reports which I have seen, what police did there, like burning her body in the night, people are very dissatisfied with this. Uttar Pradesh Police should have been more sensitive and responsible."

Solanki, a Dalit leader, is an MP from Ahmedabad (West) and has been elected to Parliament three times.

Similar sentiments were echoed by the ruling BJP's another Dalit MP Hans Raj Hans, who demanded that the Uttar Pradesh government of his party led by Yogi Adityanath should take strict actions against the officials responsible for the hasty cremation of the Hathras victim.

Some family members of the victim had alleged that the cremation was forcefully done in the dead of night, despite their objections and their requests for taking the body home for some rituals were rejected.

In a letter written to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Adityanath, Hans has requested that his government should ensure that justice is provided to the victim and that no one should dare to commit such act in the future.

The Dalit woman was allegedly raped by four upper-caste men in Hathras on September 14 and was referred to the Safdarjung Hospital in Delhi on September 28 with spinal cord injuries, paralysis and cuts in her tongue. She died around 3 am the next day.

Ever since the alleged rape case came into limelight, the BJP government in Uttar Pradesh has been under attack from the Opposition. Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra were arrested and stopped from visiting Hathras earlier in the day.