Fear grips campus after rape at gates of college

Indian lawmakers expressed anger in Parliament yesterday over the shocking roadside rape of a medical college student in New Delhi last week.

In a rare expression of political unity, MPs joined hands in Parliament's upper house, the Rajya Sabha, and vented concern over rampant sexual attacks on women in the city, saying the 24-year-old student's rape highlighted a need for better police action.

"New Delhi is fast becoming a living hell for women," said a member in the nominated upper chamber, also called the house of elders.

The victim, a final year student at New Delhi's prestigious Maulana Azad Medical College, was dragged by three men into a Mughal-built arch straddling one of the city's busiest roads and raped for more than an hour last week.

The incident occurred less than a kilometre away from the Delhi Police headquarters and her screams for help were reportedly ignored by a police armoured car parked within earshot.
No one has yet been arrested for the attack.

A day later a woman was dragged into a car and assaulted and on Wednesday two other similar incidents were reported in the city, home to 14 million residents.

MPs said New Delhi had turned into India's "crime capital" and called for the death sentence for rapists.

"Such incidents are happening when the government is talking about empowering women. Women in Delhi and other parts of the country are totally unsafe," said Kum Kum Rai of the opposition Rashtriya Janata Dal party.

"Punishment for rape should be more than that for murder as the rape victim suffers for her entire life," she said.

Days after the brutal rape , Maulana Azad Medical College college students are still in shock.

Gaurav Jain, a first year student and an office-bearer of the students union, and the only one willing to be quoted, said that part of the problem stemmed from the campus' location.

Situated on Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg - known as India's Fleet Street because offices of many of the national newspapers are located here - the campus is used as a thoroughfare. People from the Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, as well as Kotla Road walk through.

"There is a lot of eve-teasing, we're very vulnerable," says one fourth year student, who stays far away from campus, and travels by bus, where eve-teasing - a peculiar pathology of urban India - occurs everyday.

"This was an event - the rape - that was waiting to happen. We have always been apprehensive, given the atmosphere," says another girl, from the first year.

"We have been complaining but the college authorities refused to act," says another. "The teachers are supportive. But the dean of the college does not act decisively."

College officials say they cannot cordon off the campus as part of the land belongs to the Delhi Municipal Corporation.

Dr Brik Krishna Dhaon, dean of the college, is quick to point out that the brutal crime did not occur on the campus. But steps are being taken to beef up security of the campus he said. The students, including the rape victim, are sitting for their examinations, he added.

Ranjit Narayan, Joint Commissioner of Police for northern Delhi who is investigating the crime, agrees with Dhaon that the crime did not take place on the campus.

"I think the suspect was a drug addict. Otherwise, he would not have chosen the Khooni Darwaza, located in the middle of the road and chosen the middle of the day to do it," he says.

He confirms the observation of the girls at the college that the monument is used by vagabonds to spend the day.

"It is an historic monument, which falls under the Archaeological Survey of India, and there is a watchman there. But the place is open. There are no gates. Though I would not call it a den of drug addicts, it is certainly used by all kinds of people," he says.

Asked whether crimes against women are on the rise in Delhi, he says that the numbers do not support such a view. "Even a single crime committed against a woman is serious. We take all incidents seriously."