Delhi gang rape: a case for the death penalty

By Arnika Thakur
It appears to be that a rod was inserted into her and it was pulled out with so much force that the act brought out her intestines along. That is probably the only thing that explains such severe damage to her intestines,” he said.
Arnika is a multimedia journalist for Reuters India. She has previously covered Canadian equities for Reuters. Follow her on Twitter @arnikathakur

According to sources, one of the accused persons who were brought to the hospital for a medical examination on Tuesday confessed to having seen a rope-like object — likely her intestines — being pulled out of the girl by the other assailants on the bus. The sources said that the girl had bite marks on her body.
“There was permanent damage to her intestines, and with the intestines completely gone she will have to feed through intravenous fluids all her life. But that is secondary, our primary focus at the moment is to save her life,” said Dr BD Athani, Medical Superintendent, Safdarjung Hospital.

Six men gang-raped this woman, a 23-year-old medical student, on a moving bus. They beat her with an iron rod. They beat the man she was travelling with. They threw her off the bus and left her and the man for dead. She has undergone several surgeries. Doctors reportedly had to remove her small intestine.
The men who did this to her, if convicted, face a lifetime prison sentence – or maybe just 10 years. With a low conviction rate , they might yet beat the charges. What we have now is not enough. They should be hanged. To do otherwise will put India and its legal system to shame.

The laws against rape are inadequate to the point of being shameful. If a man rapes his wife, he faces no more than two years in jail. Others face comparatively little time in prison. The women, meanwhile, could face ostracism from their families and villages, scorn from the people around them, and possibly death at the hands of their own family .
Swift and harsh penalties against rapists, including the death penalty, would prevent people from seeing the crime as just one more infraction to overcome. Here are people whose history of rape did not get in the way of their lives. There was the convict who cleared his civil service exam while serving his sentence for rape. The Delhi High Court said he was in jail for such a long time that he “redeemed himself.” Last June, former President Pratibha Patil commuted the death sentences of several rapists. Among them was a man who killed a family of five and raped their young daughter.

turned my stomach to read this

  Riots Flare After Delhi Gang Rape    Indian police fired water cannons to push back protesters marching in Delhi against the brutal gang rape of a 23-year-old woman in a bus. The rioters, mostly college students, broke police barriers and headed for the presidential palace. They don’t think the government’s pledge to seek life sentences for the perpetrators is enough—they want the death penalty. After last Sunday’s attack, the government has said it would launch measures to make Delhi safer for women.