Sajjad Hussain/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIndian demonstrators in front of the monument in New Delhi India Gate overturn a police barricade during a protest calling for improved safety for women, after the rape of a schoolgirl last week.
Angry protests escalate into violence in India's capital on Sunday, after thousands of people gathered to demand justice for the victim of a recent gang rape in New Delhi and improved safety for women.
Demonstrators flocked to the India Gate monument throughout the day, despite police attempts to dissuade them and hastily enacted ban on protest in New Delhi, where they insulted the police and attacked the car of a member of Parliament. The police in turn fired tear gas and water cannons, beating protesters with bamboo sticks and arrested dozens.
In the late afternoon on Sunday, political parties had joined the crowd, by increasing the number of conflictual encounters with police. The protesters overturned a car and turned fierce fighting.
The crowd, mostly composed of young, surrounded the India Gate, but were prevented from marching to Rashtrapati Bhavan, the palatial home of the President. Hundreds of policemen, many in blue helmets from the country's force "swift action," blocked their way.
Angry pushed or jostled with police, calling them "vile," "corrupt" and "inept," as they tried to push through the cord. "Why don't you come and join us?" stirred a protester asked a senior police officer. "You're not angry about what happened?"
Sunday marked the seventh day of protests in India after a medical student was raped 16 December on a bus moving from different men, the latest in a series of violent crimes against women in northern India. Gang rape victim suffered serious intestinal injuries after being attacked with an iron rod during the assault and was fighting for her life, doctors said last week.
"We are not satisfied with this reply fragmentary, drop-in-the-ocean, inane of Government" the concerns about the safety of women, said Shakil Albeena, 36, an activist who helped mobilize protests. "We want some big changes," he said. "If the administration won't, who will?"
Another protester, Kulsoom Rashid, 27, said she had been tear-gassed on Sunday afternoon.
"This is how they are responding," she said, seething, as he rubbed his eyes vigorously. "Hundreds of rapists are running Away and the entire Delhi Police is standing here to stop people like me?"
Women's groups and students at the protests had compiled a list of four requests: want the courts to fast-track approximately 100,000 cases of allegations of rape; for the Indian police to pledge register complaints of rape when they occur; for Parliament to hold a special session to pass laws on rape, sexual harassment and abuse; and the Delhi Police Commissioner to be fired for his handling of the protests.
The police tried to prevent the demonstration from taking place on Sunday. In the morning, in the vicinity of subway stations were closed and the streets leading to India Gate have been blocked in an attempt to deter the protesters.
The protesters who were camped in the area overnight were swept away, and were arrested more than two dozen.
Police said in a statement Sunday morning that they had also imposed section 144, an emergency measure in the criminal procedure code of the country aimed at preventing riots and had outlawed large gatherings of people in New Delhi. They asked the protesters to go to the Ram Lila grounds near the Northern quarter of Old Delhi instead.
Still, protesters who poured into India Gate area, which faces the grand colonial government seat of Delhi, all Sunday, arriving on foot. Some said that footage of police dragging protestors away Sunday morning had inspired them to come.
"Many students who protested peacefully were attacked," said Jayati Ghosh, a Professor of Economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University, who had joined the protest with her daughter. "These are patriotic and respectable citizens. Cannot answer them ham-handed, "he said.
The emergency measure remained in force in New Delhi on Sunday afternoon, said Rajan Bhagat, a public relations officer with the police in Delhi, but was not called to Ram Lila. If the protestors moved there, "normal life of the city not to be disturbed," said Mr. Bhagat.
The protest Sunday paralyzed the designed by Edwin Lutyens's Delhi Center, where top government officials living in large houses set on acres of land.
The President of the Congress Party, Sonia Gandhi and her son, Rahul, General Secretary of the party, he met some protesters Sunday morning at the residence of Mrs. Gandhi, local news stations reported. "I am with you," Ms Gandhi told protesters, adding that "justice will be delivered," according to the news agency ANI.
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