The horrible tradition of rape within the Indian state the place the motorist Fernanda was gang-raped: the couple will journey to Nepal tomorrow after which take a aircraft again to Spain | EUROtoday

tenting in Dumka It was not within the plans Fernanda and Vicente. Ride a motorbike by means of the northeast of India heading in direction of the border with Nepal, however on Friday, March 1, it grew to become night time on the street. “India is not the safest country in the world to drive at night, especially on those roads in rural regions. They are barely lit and animals come across you that you don't see coming,” the Valencian explains to this newspaper. Vicente (63 years).

The horrible occasion that occurred after tenting has gone around the globe: seven males beat and gang-raped, in turns, Fernanda (28 years outdated), influencer of Brazilian origin with Spanish nationality. They tied Vicente up and in addition beat him.

The couple, who relaxation on a secure ground offered by the native authorities, will reply EL MUNDO by cellphone once more this Monday. They are overwhelmed by all of the worldwide media consideration they’re receiving. “Even newspapers from Iraq have called us,” says Vicente. Now, he says, all they need is to return to Spain.

“Fernanda is still in painbut he looks strong enough to take the motorcycle and get out of here. The plan is to go to Nepal on Tuesday, to Kathmand. It's two days of travel. There we are going to take a plane to Spain,” says Vicente. “We will leave the motorcycles in Nepal. We want to rest and be with family. Then, when Fernanda fully recovers, we will continue our tour of Asia. “We need to end in New Zealand.”

The Indian police have arrested four of the attackers and the other three have also been identified. On Sunday, the couple spent much of the day testifying before local authorities and a forensic team I collected samples in the Dumka field400 meters from the road, where they were attacked Fernanda and Vicente.

Dumka: 123 rape cases per month

Dumka It is one of the 24 districts of the state of Jharkhand, 1,300 kilometers from the capital, New Delhi. This mountainous region has a long history of armed ethnic clashes and is bathed in very poor neighborhoodswith high rates of violence and frequent sexual assaults on women, especially those who belong to the lowest castes. Jharkhand It has one of the highest rape rates in the country: 7.6 per 100,000 inhabitants.

According to the latest report from the National Crime Records Bureau of India (2022), between September 2021 and February 2022, 123 rape cases per month. Another report from the Jharkhand police, covering between January 2020 and February 2023, includes 5,255 cases of rape throughout the state.

Although the associations always emphasize that the majority of women They do not report due to the great stigma that prevails around the victims, the lack of support from the authorities, with vague police investigations that often do not resolve the cases, and families that intimidate the victims themselves so that they do not press charges or marry their own rapists.

Last January, in Dumka (99 cases of rape were reported in 2022), the same scenario where Fernanda was sexually assaulted11 people were arrested for gang rape a 10 year old girl. In April 2023, another 14-year-old girl from the same region was raped in a field in Dumka. That same month, in another nearby village, a 10-year-old girl was sexually assaulted in a group and then murdered.

In July, in the city of Ranchialso in Jharkhandtwo minor students were gang raped. That month, in the same city, another girl was sexually assaulted by a group of men. Back in Dumka in August, the principal and a security guard of a residential school were arrested for harassing female students.

Last year a movie was released, To Kill a Tigerwhich tells the story of a 13-year-old girl from Jharkhand who was gang raped and shamed by all her neighbors. His father, a very poor farmer, began a desperate fight for justice. The minor's family faced deep social hostility after the father filed a complaint against the attackers. The villagers They expected the girl to marry one of her rapistsas is often the practice.

Just five days ago, in another district of Jharkhand, Another 13-year-old girl was killed while resisting a rape attempt. Two 21-year-old men strangled her. Going back years, there are many news stories about cases of sexual assault in this state: a 55-year-old farmer raped by two police officers, a 33-year-old teacher raped by four students…

India: one rape every 18 minutes

In IndiaAccording to official data, an average of almost 90 rapes are reported every day. That is to say, there is a rape every 18 minutes. In 2012, a gang rape and murder of an Indian student opened the International sections of newspapers around the world.

Jyoti Singh Pandey and her six rapists They inserted a metal bar into his abdomen and they tore out a large part of his intestine. She was savagely tortured in the back of a bus in New Delhi. In addition to her beatings, they left 13 bite marks all over her body. Leaving her for dead, they dumped her body on the side of a road. But Singh was still alive. He survived long enough to identify his attackers. He died in the hospital 13 days later. He was 23 years old.

The event caused one wave of protests throughout the country that helped the Government amend a series of laws. A broader definition of the violence against women; they opened centers to provide legal and medical support to victims; They installed more closed circuit cameras on the streets of New Delhi; they deployed police on the buses; They issued stricter punishments for rapists, including the death penalty.