Lost one more daughter: Nirbhaya’s mother

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, December 7

As protests broke out across Uttar Pradesh over the death of the Unnao rape victim, the mother of Nirbhaya, who succumbed to the brutal sexual assault in Delhi spent her day reliving the painful memories of December 2012.

Amid calls from the Unnao victim’s father to gun down her daughter’s assailants the way Telangana Police had killed the perpetrators of the recent Hyderabad gangrape and murder, Nirbhaya’s mother said, “What else should the families do? Where are we getting? We are getting nowhere. I do not know what to say any longer. I am so tired.”

The family of 2012 Delhi gangrape victim has waited for justice for seven years. They are now frustrated over the rising brutality against women and the pattern of perpetrators burning the victims to death.

“I had confidence in the criminal justice system when the laws were amended and national outcry was addressed after my daughter’s untimely death. I had thought the system would make an example of the four convicts who brutalised my daughter. But nothing of the sort happened,” she said.

The family of the Delhi gangrape victim also asked about the whereabouts of the juvenile who raped their daughter.

“The Juvenile Justice Act was amended later to allow for adult trial of 16 to 18-year-old juveniles accused of committing heinous crimes but one of my daughter’s killer walked away because he was below 18 years at the time of the crime. The criminal law amendment could not be applied retrospectively. I want to know where that man is today? Does society have the right to know or not?” she asks, adding that the commission set up to recommend criminal law amendments in December 2012 had also recommended a registry of sex offenders which had not been finalised.

The family also said they would not judge anyone seeking vigilante justice adding, “That’s for the system to see.”

The Delhi victim’s elder brother recalled her sister’s deathwish. “She wanted her assailants be torched to death publicly. When the criminal justice system fails to deliver, when trials become endless, when the victim and her family die a thousand deaths each day, what does one do? These are questions the police and judiciary must confront and address.” Four convicts in the Delhi gangrape case were awarded death sentence in September 2013. They are yet to be hanged.

Rape convict demands withdrawal of mercy plea 

• Vinay Sharma, one of the four convicts in the 2012 Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case, on Saturday sought immediate withdrawal of his mercy plea from President Ram Nath Kovind, saying it was sent without his consent 
• The convict alleged his mercy plea had been sent by the Tihar jail authorities with a ‘mala fide intention’ and in ‘criminal conspiracy’ with the Delhi govt
• Sharma said he was yet to exhaust all legal remedies available to him before filing the mercy plea as he has not filed any curative petition before the Supreme Court. PTI