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Journalism of Courage
Union Home Minister Amit Shah has spoken to Manipur Chief Minister N Biren Singh over the recent viral video of two women being paraded naked on a road by a mob of men and being sexually assaulted, sources said. The incident took place on May 4 in Thoubal district – when violence first started and a zero FIR had been registered in the matter on May 18 in Kangpokpi district.
A source said the Manipur DGP Rajiv Kumar has briefed CM Singh that they have formed multiple teams to nab all the accused.
The two women, one in her 20s and the other in her 40s, are from the Kuki-Zomi-dominated hill district of Kangpokpi. In the video, they can be seen being made to walk naked down a road and towards a field by a mob of men. Some of the men can be seen dragging the two women towards a field and forcibly groping them.
While the incident had taken place in the Meitei-dominated valley district of Thoubal, the victims later filed a complaint at a police station in Kangpokpi district where a zero FIR was registered and the case was forwarded to the police station concerned in Thoubal.
According to their complaint, while the video shows only two women, there was another woman in her 50s who was also forced to take off her clothes by the crowd. The complaint also alleged that the younger woman was “brutally gang raped in the broad daylight”.
In their complaint, the victims have said that five members of the village – the three women and two family members of the youngest – had fled towards the forest after a “group of 800-1,000 persons carrying sophisticated weapons like AK Rifles, SLR, INSAS and .303 Rifles” entered their village and began looting and burning it on May 4 afternoon, a day after violence had erupted in the state on May 3.
They said they were later rescued by the police and were being taken to the police station, but were stopped on the way by a mob and seized from police custody around two kilometres away from the station.
They stated that the youngest woman’s father was killed on the spot and that “all three women were physically forced to remove their clothes and were stripped naked in front of the mob”, after which they alleged that the youngest was raped in front of the others. They also alleged that her brother was killed while trying to help her.
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