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Muslims flee village after rape, murder of 8-year-old girl in occupied Kashmir

By AFP
April 18, 2018

RASANA: There are no Muslims left in the village of Rasana, which has become a symbol of rape crisis after the brutal murder of an eight-year-old Muslim girl blamed on Hindu men in Indian occupied Kashmir.

Police say the girl was raped and killed as part of an attempt by some of the village´s majority Hindus to evict Bakarwal Muslim nomads, who graze their cattle in the hills in the summer months.

It seems to have worked: the girl´s family have headed for the Kashmir hills under police protection. Other Muslim families in the community of around 100 people all left after the rape in January.

At the empty home of the dead girl´s family, five armed police kept guard half asleep in chairs outside.

Police say the child was drugged, held captive in a Hindu temple for five days, and repeatedly raped before being beaten to death.

Her anonymous grave in orange earth partially covered by weeds is in a nearby village in Kathua district, about 60 kilometres (40 miles) from the region´s main city Jammu.

Media reports said Hindus in Rasana refused to allow the girl to be buried there.

In occupied Kashmir, the Jammu region in the south is dominated by Hindus.

Hindus and Muslims had lived together relatively peacefully in Rasana until the killing, though each side had made sporadic police complaints about the other, according to official documents.

The rape went virtually unnoticed in India until Hindu lawyers staged protests outside a Jammu court last week trying to stop police registering the charge sheet. Hindu right-wing groups say the investigation is biased.

The release of horrific details of the murder of the girl, whose identity cannot be disclosed by law, made national headlines and sparked protests against the lack of action on sexual violence in India.

The eruption of anger has reminded many of the outrage and demonstrations triggered by the fatal gang-rape of a Delhi student on a bus in 2012 that also made headlines around the world.