COURT’S TEAM VISITS GYANVAPI COMPLEX, FAILS TO CONDUCT SURVEY

VARANASI: A survey of the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi by a local court-appointed advocate commissioner Ajai Kumar and his team could not be conducted on Saturday as lawyers of the Anjuman Intezamia Masjid Committee, which manages the mosque, opposed the exercise in court. The mosque committee on Saturday filed a petition in the court of civil judge Ravi Kumar Diwakar, urging him to replace Kumar. After hearing the matter, the court directed the plaintiffs and the advocate commissioner to present their arguments on May 9.

In August 2021, one Rakhi Singh and five others filed a petition seeking permission for daily worship of Maa Shringar Gauri Sthal in the Kashi Vishwanathgyanvapi complex.

LALITPUR AND KANPUR: “I feel safer,” the 13-year-old girl said from somewhere inside the tiny dark room, a sizeable portion of which is occupied by large sacks stuffed with straw.

“You watch, I’ll be able to fight,” a brief pause later she adds, the firmness in her voice palpable.

After spending five days under the protection of the Child Welfare Committee (CWC), the survivor of the Lalitpur gang rape case was escorted home by a bunch of police personnel in two multi-utility vehicles. Along with the child was her mother who was allowed to be by her side in the CWC’S shelter.

While the mother tried to set the chaotic little house in order on

Saturday afternoon, and tended to her seven other younger children, the girl went into a dark corner of the house, refusing to emerge. “She has only been crying all through. I am trying to make her forget what happened, but she keeps getting reminded of it,” said the mother.

The entire Pali police station staff was transferred on May 3 after it emerged that the girl was kidnapped and gang raped for four days in Bhopal, and then allegedly raped again by the station house officer (SHO) when she went to record her statement on April 27. This has made the family confident to fight on, but their anger hasn’t subsided.

“I knew the SHO (Tilakdhari Saroj) was a bad man, but I didn’t know he was a demon,” the mother, squatting under the sun outside her house, said.