Mumbai gang-rape: Five held over attack on photo-journalist
Woman taken to hospital following attack in abandoned textile mill in one of the city's fastest-growing neighbourhoods
Maseeh Rahman in Delhi
The Guardian, Friday 23 August 2013 10.28 BST
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A woman working on an assignment to photograph old buildings in Mumbai was raped by five men on Thursday evening in an abandoned textile mill, provoking national outrage similar to that following last year's fatal gang-rape of a physiotherapist in Delhi.
The photojournalist was working on a photo feature on the crumbling residential buildings of former textile mill workers for a Mumbai-based English-language magazine.
She was taken to the Jaslok hospital after the attack, where doctors said her medical condition was stable.
Police arrested five men from the area in connection with the gang-rape, but the Mumbai commissioner, Satya Pal Singh, refused to give any details about those arrested, saying it was "a sensitive case".
"The woman, who is around 22 years old, had gone inside the Shakti Mills compound at about 6pm along with a young man who was carrying the cameras," Singh said. "Five men who were inside the derelict textile mill first accused the woman's companion of being wanted for a murder, tied him up with a belt, then took the woman aside and took turns raping her."
After the fatal gang-rape of a 23-year-old physiotherapist on a Delhi bus last December, Mumbai was often cited as an Indian city where women could feel safe on the streets.
"Mumbai was always safe for women, but in recent years the emphasis of the police and the home department has shifted from protecting women to restricting women's freedom," said Kavita Krishnan, a women's activist.
Krishnan recalled recent instances of "moral policing" in the city, with overzealous policemen targeting women in restaurants and bars. Maharashtra state's home minister, RR Patil, has also focused on closing down bars where women dance on stage, and wants to retain the ban despite strictures from India's supreme court.
"Mumbai's famous textile mill area was once one of the safest neighbourhoods in the city, with men and women working together," said Krishnan. "It's sad that this has happened now."
"Mumbai will feel safe for women again only if police focus on protecting us, not restricting us," she said. A month ago there was an acid attack on a woman in a suburb and last Sunday an American woman was attacked and robbed on a local train in the city's business district.
"Like every woman in Mumbai, I have held on desperately to the hope that women are safe in this city," blogged journalist Deepanjana Pal. "Yesterday, that faith was brutally violated."
After the Delhi gang-rape, the law was amended to make it more difficult for rapists to get off lightly or escape punishment. After Thursday evening's outrage in Mumbai, there are demands once again for a stricter law.
"There has to be deterrence. Must have stricter laws," tweeted the union minister, Kapil Sibal, who is also a prominent lawyer.
