Attack on woman in unguarded ATM condemned

People across India have condemned the assault on woman by a burglar inside an unguarded ATM booth in Bangalore, even as police and doctors said the victim is recovering after surgery.

A man attacked the woman with a machete and robbed her inside an ATM booth at around 7.10 a.m. on Tuesday. CCTV footage showed the man attacking the woman on her face and head.

Bangalore Police Commissioner Raghavendra Auradkar said: "She is speaking. She has undergone an operation, but she has lost a lot of blood. Therefore, weakness is there. She is recovering."

After attacking the woman, man fled from the spot and left her in a pool of blood for hours.

Reportedly, the doctors said the victim had suffered injuries on her skull, and has been paralysed on the right side of her body.

"The government has to take steps regarding this. In case of CCTV camera or ATMs, they should make sure that there is another person to take care to ensure security so that he can inform other authorities," said Bangalore resident Bhavya.

Women safety in India has been in the spotlight this year following the brutal gang-rape of a 23-year-old student on a moving bus in New Delhi in December last year, which led thousands of Indians to take to the streets in protest. The woman died of her injuries two weeks later in a Singapore hospital.

A law passed in March provides for stricter punishments on gender crimes. It punishes repeat rape offenders with death, criminalises voyeurism and stalking and makes acid attacks, gang rape and trafficking specific offences.

Women's rights groups have welcomed the measures but say they do not go far enough, terming them "token gestures" from a government that is still plagued, like much of Indian society, by patriarchal attitudes.

Condemning the incident, social activist, Saraswati Ghosh said: "The Indian government has to take a very positive step on two sides - One, whatever has happened, with whomever, the government should take a quick step and deliver justice quickly. They should be compensated and rehabilitated, and Two, there should be preventive measures and that should be publicised widely."

Former senior police officer and now civil rights activist Kiran Bedi said: "There is no strong base for the prevention of crime in our country. Due to this, there is no fear of law. Such incidents openly take place due to no fear of the law. Until we correct our basic policing, which is also called as daily policing, homework daily policing, which is strongly associated with crime prevention, strong crime detection and punishment, we have to suffer such crimes until there is no holistic approach."

Issues such as rape, dowry-related deaths and female infanticide rarely enter mainstream political discourse in India.

Statistics reveal that 244,270 crimes against women were reported to the police in 2012, against 228,650 in 2011, according to the National Crimes Records Bureau (NCRB).

These include rapes, kidnappings, sexual harassment, trafficking, molestation and cruelty by husbands and relatives. They also include crimes in which a woman was driven to suicide as a result of demands for a dowry from her husband or in-laws.