AAP files police complaint against threats to rape victim's family

The Aam Admi Party has filed a police complaint against police personnel who had tried to coerce and threaten the family of the Bengal double gangrape victim to hand over her death certificate so her last rites could be held, a party leader said Saturday.

The fledgling West Bengal unit of AAP would also bring out a rally in the city Sunday protesting against the rising atrocities on women in the state, party leader Mukul Kesri told IANS.

"We have already lodged a complaint at the airport police station against police officers, who, instead of helping out the family members of the victim, put pressure on them to hand over her death certificate," said Kesri.

The party would also file a complaint against the state-run R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital for alleged neglect in the treatment of the victim, who was admitted there with serious burn injuries Dec 23. She died Dec 31.

"There are allegations police helped neither the victim nor the family. We are studying all aspect of the case to see what more needs to be done," said Kesri.

"We demand arrest of all the culprits, quick justice in this incident as also in other similar cases," he said.

Regarding Sunday's rally from Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose's statue in North Kolkata's Shyambazar to Esplanade, he said candles would be lit to display solidarity towards all victims of atrocities against women once the progamme ends.

The girl, whose father is a taxi driver hailing from Bihar, was gang raped twice in October in Madhyamgram of North 24-Parganas district. She breathed her last Tuesday at a government hospital where she was admitted with severe burn injuries Dec 23.

Police have slapped murder charges against two accused, now under custody, based on the girl's dying declaration that the duo had set her ablaze. They have however drawn flak for their alleged efforts to perform the last rites of the girl themselves to prevent any demonstration with the body.

The girl's father was whisked to the airport police station in the city's north eastern outskirts Dec 31 and first cajoled and then threatened that he would not be allowed to ply his taxi in the city if he did not hand over the death certificate.

The father has alleged that later ruling Trinamool Congress supporters laid siege on his residence, hurled stones and barged in asking them to hand over the body to the police and go back to Bihar.