The family of the 13-year-old girl belonging to a Scheduled Caste community, who was beheaded by a caste Hindu man at Thalavaipatti near Attur in Salem district on Monday, has appealed to the police to invoke provisions of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act against the accused and ensure that he gets exemplary punishment.
Addressing mediapersons at the office of Evidence, a non-governmental organisation (NGO), here on Saturday, the girl’s mother S. Chinnaponnu claimed that her daughter, a Class VIII student, had been facing sexual harassment from the accused, K. Dinesh Kumar, 27.
Brutal attack
“Three days before the murder, she fell silent and refused to go to school. After repeated questioning, only on the day of the murder, she told me that Dinesh Kumar made sexual advances towards her,” Ms. Chinnaponnu said.
Later in the evening, Dinesh Kumar entered the house when only Ms. Chinnaponnu and her daughter were at home, and brutally attacked them.
“Before I fell unconscious, the last words I heard were my daughter pleading with him not to hack her,” she said.
As she regained consciousness, Ms. Chinnaponnu said she saw the beheaded body of her daughter lying in front of her house. “He left her head on the nearby road,” she said.
Samivel, the girl’s father, expressed disappointment with the police investigation.
Arrests and enquiries
“After beheading my daughter, Dinesh Kumar went with his wife and brother-in-law on a two-wheeler to surrender at the Attur police station, which indicated that all the three knew that the murder was going to happen,” he said. “However, the police have not arrested or enquired the remaining two,” he said.
A. Kathir, executive director of Evidence, said the silence of the civil society and organisations like the National Human Rights Commission, the National Commission for Scheduled Castes and the National Commission for Women regarding the incident was deafening.
“In this case, not even the Salem District Collector or the Superintendent of Police have visited the family of the victim,” Mr. Kathir said.
Refers to #MeToo
Noting that though the recent ‘#MeToo’ movement had given a voice to “upper caste and upper class women”, he said the harassment faced by Dalit women and those from other socio-economically backward communities remained largely unspoken about.
Demanding that the accused not be granted bail until the trial of the case was over, Mr. Kathir said the State government must monitor the case at the highest level to ensure that the guilty received swift punishment.
