‘No place for women here’: Priyanka slams UP govt after meeting Unnao victim’s kin

Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Saturday reached Unnao in Uttar Pradesh to meet the family of the woman who was raped and set on fire by five men. The woman died at a hospital in New Delhi after being treated there for burn injuries.

“Chief Minister is saying there is no place for criminals in the state but what he has turned the state into, I think there is no place for women here,” she said after meeting the family.

“Victim’s whole family has been constantly harassed since last year. I have heard that the culprits have some BJP connection. That is why they were being shielded. There is no fear among criminals in the state,” Priyanka Gandhi added.

“She is gone, but I will keep fighting for justice. I will not rest until justice is served. Either shoot them like the rapists were in Hyderabad or hang them,” said the woman’s father after meeting Priyanka Gandhi.

“We have been asking for justice from CM and the government, but no one listened,” he added.

Congress leader and her brother Rahul Gandhi said he is stunned by what happened in Unnao. “I am appalled and stunned by what happened in Unnao and the innocent daughter’s heart-breaking death. She died hoping for justice. My condolences are with her family,” he said on Twitter in Hindi.

Priyanka had attacked the state government earlier in the day, questioning lack of security measures to keep the victim safe. “Keeping in view the past incident why the victim was not given security? What action was taken against the officer who did not lodge her FIR? Atrocity on women is an everyday affair in Uttar Pradesh. What action is the government taking?” she said on Twitter.

In the second tweet she said, “I pray the family of Unnao victim gets strength in this moment of grief. It is failure of all of us that we could not get justice to her. We all are responsible socially but this also shows the hollowness in law and order situation in Uttar Pradesh.”

In her statement to Sub-Divisional Magistrate Dayashankar Pathak, the victim had said she was abducted and raped by Shivam Trivedi and Shubham Trivedi in December 2018 and the trial of the case is going on in a Raebareli court.

She said she was going to Raebareli to pursue the case, but when she reached Gaura turn, Harishankar Trivedi, Ram Kishore Trivedi, Umesh Bajpai along with Shivam and Shubham, armed with knives and lathis attacked her and set her on fire.

All the five men involved in the Thursday morning attack were arrested within hours of the crime. They were produced before a court in Uttar Pradesh’s Unnao on Friday and remanded to 14-day judicial custody.