NEW DELHI – The father of the eight-year-old girl, who was brutallygangraped and murdered in Kathua in Occupied Jammu and Kashmir, hasapproached the Supreme Court seeking safety and security. He has demandedthat the case, which has led to country-wide uproar, be shifted to a courtoutside Jammu and Kashmir.

The top court is likely to hear the case at 2 pm.

He has demanded in his plea that the case should be transferred toChandigarh, claiming that the trial might get influenced in Jammu. Thevictim’s father has further demanded that the trial must be put on holdunless the case is transferred out of Jammu.

The plea further says that politicians must be stopped from meeting thejuvenile accused in the case, and that the status report of the case shouldbe submitted before the Supreme Court as the case proceeds.

This comes as the trial in the case began in the rape and murder case onMonday. The court was, however, adjourned soon after the hearing began asthe defence claimed that the Jammu and Kashmir Police had not provided acopy of the chargesheet to them.

The next hearing in the case has been scheduled for April 28.

Notably, the victim’s father has moved the Supreme Court after his lawyer,Deepika Singh Rajawat, claimed threat to her life. She claimed that shefeared getting raped or killed following threats. She had decided to informthe Supreme Court about the same.

Speaking to news agency ANI, Deepika had said, “I don’t know till when Iwill be alive. I can be raped, my modesty can be outraged, I can be killed,I can be damaged. I was threatened that ‘we will not forgive you’. I amgoing to tell SC that I am in danger.”

An eight-year-old girl belonging to the nomadic community had gone missingon January 10 while grazing horses in Rasana forest in Kathua’s Hiranagararea. Her body was found a week later. Police investigations revealed shewas held captive inside a temple, sedated and repeatedly raped before hermurder.