SRINAGAR – The repeated rape and subsequent murder of the minor Muslimgirl has resulted into the communal violence and clashes in occupiedKashmir.
In January, eight-year-old Asif Bano was grazing her horses in Harinagardistrict of Indian occupied Kashmir when she lost track of some of herhorses. She enquired about their whereabouts from people nearby, when a manoffered to help and took her to a nearby forest.
The man also called his friend to the jungle. She sensed that there wasdanger ahead, she tried to flee but one of the men grabbed the minor by herneck and forced her to swallow sedatives. The girl was dragged to a nearbytemple, Devistan, and locked inside, the police said.
For the next three days, the two men tied the minor and took turns to rapeher over and over before strangling her to death, according to the fulltext of charge sheet shared on First Postlink>.
On the other hand, the effort of the girl’s family to look for her went invain. Days later, the body of minor smeared with blood was found in theforest.
The case which initially seemed to be an isolated, heinous episode ofsexual violence has escalated communal tensions in IoK. Over the course ofthe investigation, the police found out that the suspects engaged in theheinous act to drive out the Muslim community of Bakarwals from the tehsil.
The police have arrested eight men in the case and several have confessedto the crime. The custodian of the Devistan temple, Sanji Ram, has beenlabelled as ‘the mastermind’ behind the plot. The accused also includespolice officers who confessed to having accepted thousands of dollars tocover up the crime, reported Times of Indialink>.
While the Bakarwals and others demand justice for Asifa, Hindu nationalistshave jumped into the defence of the accused. For generations, Bakarwalnomads, who drift with their herds across the plains and hills of IoK, haveleased pastures from Hindu farmers for their animals to graze in winter.But in recent years, some Hindus in the Kathua area have begun a campaignof abuse against the nomads.
On the other hand, India’s dominant political force, the Hindu nationalistBharatiya Janata Party, are pushing to have the case taken out of the handsof the state police, arguing that the Central Bureau of Investigation wouldbe a more neutral agency to handle it.
It is suspected that this is an attempt to win leniency for the accused.
Earlier this week, a mob of Hindu lawyers physically blocked policeofficers from entering a courthouse to file charges against the men. Theofficers, however, retreated to a judge’s house later in the evening tocomplete the paperwork.