In another shocking case, the Delhi police have arrested a man in his 30s for the rape and assault of an 86-year-old grandmother.
While sharing the details of the heartbreaking incident, Swati Maliwal, head of the Delhi Commission for Women, told the BBC:
“The woman was waiting outside her home on Monday evening for the milkman when she was approached by her attacker. Her told her that her regular milk delivery man wasn’t coming and offered to take her to the place where she could get milk. “
The 86-year-old grandmother trusted the culprit and accompanied him. While sharing how the accused took her to a nearby farm and raped her, Ms. Maliwal added:
“She kept crying and begging him to leave her. She told him that she was like his grandmother. But he ignored her pleas and assaulted her mercilessly when she tried to resist and protect herself,”Â
When the local villagers, who were passing by heard her cries, they came to the rescue of the helpless grandmother. The villagers handed over the attacker to the police.
Describing her meeting with the survivor as heartbreaking, Ms. Maliwal added:
“Her hands are totally wrinkled. You get a shock when you hear what she went through. There are bruises on her face and all over her body and she told me that she had vaginal bleeding. She is suffering from extreme trauma.”
Calling the accused as ‘not human’, Ms. Swati Maliwal is demanding the death penalty for the attacker
“I’m writing to the chief justice of Delhi High Court and the lieutenant-governor of the city to fast-track the case and hang him in six months,”Â
This heartbreaking incident, that happened in Delhi’s Chhawla area, is just another ugly reminder of how women are not safe in our country. It makes us wonder how badly our social DNA has been degraded that even our 80-year-old woman are made victims of sex-deprived monsters.
A few days back, another rape case came to light where the ambulance driver allegedly raped a Covid-19 patient while taking her to hospital. Last month, a 13-year-old girl was found raped and murdered in a sugarcane field and her father alleged that her eyes were gouged out and her tongue had been cut.Â
It is heart wrenching how we are miserably failing to save our women. Doesn’t matter if they are 8, 18, or 80 years-old, our patriarchal mindset and degraded social DNA is failing them. Despite our country introduced tough new rape laws, including the death penalty in especially horrific cases, and promised to set up fast-track courts to try rape cases, still there is not much change in the situation.
We are not only shamed but heartbroken what this 86-year-old had to go through. Though we are hoping that authorities will get this grandmother justice, we feel scared for what the future holds for millions of Indian women.