Arrested suspect Chand Babu Sattat Shaikh alias Mohammed Abdul
The gang-rape of a photojournalist in Mumbai has triggered protests in the city and anger elsewhere, with the heinous assault underscoring that nothing has changed since December, when a student was fatally gang-raped on a moving bus in Delhi.
There are worrying parallels: the photojournalist is 22 years old and was attacked while she was with a male colleague on a shoot in the heart of Mumbai at 6 pm; he was tied up with a belt while five men took turns raping her, the police said. (
Read: Mumbai gang-rape case - three arrested, brave survivor says she wants to work again)
The physiotherapist intern who was assaulted in Delhi was 23 and her boyfriend had been beaten with an iron rod before a group of six men attacked her.
In the Delhi case, one of the six men arrested for the crime was 17 years old when the woman was attacked. He is being tried by a juvenile court which is likely to deliver its verdict on whether he is guilty on August 31. If convicted, he faces a maximum of three years in a reform home.
In the Mumbai case, the grandmother of Chand Babu Sattat Shaikh alias Mohammed Abdul, one of the two suspects arrested so far for Thursday's attack, says that he is 16 years old. The birth certificate she furnished showed clear signs of tampering; the year of his birth appears to have been changed.
The police however insist he is not a juvenile. To back their claim, they say police records show he was 17 years old when he was booked for a theft in 2011.
Based on the Delhi case, BJP leader Subramanian Swamy has asked the Supreme Court to order that the "mental and intellectual maturity" of a juvenile offender be taken into account at the time of the crime. The court has agreed to hear his plea.