Hundreds have taken to the streets of India’s capital on Sunday to protest the impending release of a juvenile convicted in the 2012 Delhi gang rape case.
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The man, who was 17 at the time of the crime and can not be named, was sentenced to three years in a reform facility in August 2013 and finished his term this weekend.
Some of the protesters including the mother of the victim were dragged away by the police who had imposed prohibitory orders in the high-security area.
Delhi Commission for Women ( DCW) chief Swati Maliwal on Sunday wrote to Juvenile Justice Board requesting not to release juvenile convict in the brutal gangrape case.
News of the release came only hours before a hearing on Monday at India’s Supreme Court where a women’s rights group will file a petition against the release.
The man was just short of his 18th birthday when he and five others brutally attacked the 23-year-old woman in a case that shocked India, where sexual violence against women is rampant.
The grounds which has been taken in the appeal against the High Court order says that no mental assessment of the state of mind of the juvenile offender has been taken into account for his release. Senior Supreme Court lawyer K.V. Dhananjay said there was no law under which the apex court could extend the young man’s detention.
Demonstrators shout slogans as police detain others during a protest against the release of a juvenile rape convict, in New Delhi, India, December 20, 2015. While she was spearheading the protest, Nirbhaya’s mother was detained by the police, only to be released later. “What is the meaning of democracy if we are not allowed to protest peacefully?” questioned Badrinath Singh, father of the victim.
“We had gone there to demand justice but we were harassed”. Annie Raja, general secretary of the National Federation of Indian Women, said the juvenile has been meted out a “softer sentence” and the example set by his release would not act as a deterrent for the crime he had committed. The victim died of her severe injuries a few days later. Four of the adults were sentenced to death while the fifth hanged himself in prison.
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Members of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government have pushed to change the juvenile law and reduce the age of attaining adulthood from 18 to 16, but the matter is yet to be approved by parliament.
