People's Democracy

Rapist Roams Free in Punjab

ON Sunday, July 28, 2013, the All India Agricultural Workers Union (AIAWU) held a mass meeting at Jagraon in Ludhiana district of Punjab. The meeting was addressed by AIAWU joint secretary Suneet Chopra who is also a member of the CPI(M) Central Committee, Bhoop Chand Channo and Ram Singh Nurpuri (president and working president of the state unit of the union), and Amarjeet Mattu (joint secretary of the union and the CPI(M)’s Ludhiana district secretary), among others. The speakers highlighted the shocking atrocities being perpetrated against dalits under the Akali-BJP regime in Punjab --- in the district and in the state as a whole --- after the panchayat elections.

Notable among these was the shocking case of a 16 years old dalit girl, who is the daughter of a rickshaw puller. The latter is a resident of Kothe-Fathedin village and has lost his wife. It was thus that the victim girl was living in the house of a relative, Balwinder Kaur, wife of Pinder Singh. It was here that allegedly with Balwinder Kaur’s connivance, the village sarpanch Parminder Singh forced his way into the house around 2 pm on May 28, 2013, and raped the victim at gun point.

The terrified girl was at first was unable to communicate this to any one. However, on July 11, 2013, a first information report (FIR) was registered at Jagraon police station in which the rapist was charged under sections 154, 376, 506 and 120b of the IPC and also under sections 25, 27, 54, 59a of the SRMS Act of 1959. While his accomplice was arrested, the rapist is still roaming free although he was in possession of illegal weapons which were not taken away even during the panchayat elections. Moreover, the Akalis have gone to the extent of holding a dharna in support of the rapist on July 22, claiming that the girl is not a minor. It is as if raping an adult woman is something that can be condoned.

The AIAWU has expressed its firm determination to conduct a struggle in this case until the girl gets justice and the rapist is severely punished. On July 29, 2013, Suneet Chopra and all-India SFI leader Shatarup Ghosh met Ms Shamina Shafiq, a member of the National Commission for Women (NCW), who registered the compliant and promised to institute an enquiry.

The AIAWU has demanded the immediate arrest of Parminder Singh and punishment to him.

At the same meeting, the union also took up the case of the destruction of nearly over 100 dalit houses in Chak village in the district, a number of them with pattas. The union has decided to resist this violence following the panchayat elections.