NEW DELHI: India’s top police agency Wednesday took over investigations into the brutal rape and murder of young medic, a killing that has sparked outrage and fellow doctors to go on strike.
The 31-year-old woman’s brutalized body was found last week in a state-run hospital in West Bengal’s Kolkata, where she was a resident doctor.
A subsequent autopsy confirmed sexual assault and homicide.
In a petition to the court, the victim’s parents have said that they suspected their daughter was gang-raped, according to Indian broadcaster NDTV.
Doctors in government hospitals across several states have halted elective services “indefinitely,” demanding speedy justice and better workplace security.
While police have detained a man who worked at the victim’s hospital helping people navigate busy queues, officers have been accused of alleged mishandling of the case.
Kolkata’s High Court on Tuesday transferred the case to the elite Central Bureau of Investigation to “inspire public confidence.”
Sexual violence against women is a widespread problem in India — an average of nearly 90 rapes a day were reported in 2022 in the country of 1.4 billion people.
The gruesome nature of the attack have invoked comparisons with the horrific 2012 gang rape and murder of a young on a Delhi bus.
The woman became a symbol of the socially conservative country’s failure to tackle sexual violence against women.
Her death sparked huge, and at times violent, demonstrations in Delhi and elsewhere.
Under pressure, the government introduced harsher penalties for rapists, and the death penalty for repeat offenders.
Several new sexual offenses were also introduced, including stalking and jail sentences for officials who failed to register rape complaints.
India’s top police take over medic murder probe
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India’s top police take over medic murder probe
- The 31-year-old woman’s brutalized body was found last week in a state-run hospital in West Bengal’s Kolkata, where she was a resident doctor
- A subsequent autopsy confirmed sexual assault and homicide
Militants kill 6 officers and a civilian in ambushes on police vehicles in northwest Pakistan
- Assailants ambushed a police vehicle and killed one officer in Kohat — when police reinforcements arrived, they launched another attack and killed five more officers and a civilian
- No group claimed responsibility for this week’s attacks, but suspicion may fall on the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or the TTP
PESHAWAR, Pakistan: A pair of attacks on police vehicles by suspected militants killed at least six police officers and a civilian in northwest Pakistan on Tuesday, authorities said.
The assailants ambushed a police vehicle and killed one officer in Kohat, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. When police reinforcements arrived minutes later, they launched another attack and killed five more officers and a civilian, police official Kamran Khan said.
Separately on Tuesday, a suicide bomber detonated explosives at a police post in Bukkur, a district in eastern Punjab province, killing two officers and wounding four others, police official Shahzad Rafiq said.
He provided no further details and only said officers were still investigating.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attacks, which have increased across the country in recent months.
President Asif Ali Zardari condemned the attacks in Kohat and Bukkur and offered condolences to the victims’ families.
The latest violence followed an attack on a paramilitary post in Karak on Monday, when a drone loaded with explosives wounded several officers. The attackers later ambushed two ambulances transporting the wounded, killing three officers and burning their bodies before fleeing. The driver of the second ambulance transported several wounded officers despite suffering burn injuries and authorities recovered the remains of the three officers.
No group claimed responsibility for this week’s attacks, but suspicion may fall on the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or the TTP. The TTP is separate from, but closely allied with, Afghanistan’s Taliban. Islamabad has accused the group of operating from inside Afghanistan, a claim the TTP and Kabul deny.
Pakistan’s military said it killed at least 70 militants on Sunday in strikes along the Afghan border, targeting hideouts of Pakistani militants blamed for recent attacks inside the country.
