Agencies/New Delhi

Prime Minister Narendra Modi yesterday urged lawmakers to work together to protect women in his first comments on the issue since the horrific gang-rape and lynching of two girls last month.
Modi warned lawmakers against “politicising rape,” saying they were “playing with the dignity of women” in his first speech to parliament since sweeping to power at last month’s elections.
Modi singled out the rape and murder of the two girls in Uttar Pradesh, where a political row has erupted as anger mounts over the state government’s handling of the attacks.
The prime minister said lawmakers must work to end attacks, which women’s groups claim have reached “epidemic” levels despite mass protests over the fatal gang-rape of a student in Delhi in December 2012.
“Governments will have to work strictly against this, else our own souls will not forgive us,” Modi said in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of parliament, as MPs thumped their desks in agreement.
“That’s why I appeal to all state ministers, all ministers please stop politicising rape.”
“Does it suit us to make comments on such incidents, can we not be quiet?
“We are playing with the dignity of women.”
“Respect for women, their security — it should be the priority for all 1.2bn people.”
“All these incidents should make us introspect. The government will have to act. The country won’t wait and people won’t forget,” Modi said, urging politicians not to speculate publicly on why rapes are committed.
Modi also said women need to come to the mainstream of economic activities.
“Our mothers and sisters need to be connected with the mainstream from an economic point of view,” he said.
The appeal comes after a string of politicians including from his own Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) made controversial comments over the attacks on the two girls which further inflamed public anger.
A minister from central Chhattisgarh state said on the weekend that “these kind of incidents happen accidentally.”
Last week, a minister from Madhya Pradesh said rapes were “sometimes right, sometimes wrong.”
The girls, aged 14 and 15, were found hanging from a mango tree in their impoverished village with tests showing they had been raped multiple times.
Their families claimed police initially failed to take action because they were from a low caste.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, already under fire over his handling of the gang-rape of the girls, accused the families on the weekend of coming under the influence of a rival political party, a claim they have denied.
Mulayam Singh Yadav, the head of Uttar Pradesh’s ruling Samajwadi Party, who is also the chief minister’s father, sparked uproar during the election campaign when he said rapists should not receive the death penalty because “boys will be boys.”
Yesterday, another woman was found hanged from a tree near the Nepal border in Uttar Pradesh. Police have opened a murder investigation and are awaiting the findings of a postmortem to determine whether the 45-year-old victim was raped before her death, local police chief Happy Guptan said.  
India toughened its laws on sex attacks in the wake of the 2012 gang-rape of the student on a bus in Delhi which triggered outrage, but they have done little to stem the tide of sex attacks.




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