Father of the man held for rape of 12-year-old girl in Ujjain seeks death penalty for son

Ujjain (MP): The father of the man arrested for allegedly raping a 12-year-old girl here on Friday demanded capital punishment for his son, while the local bar association appealed that no lawyer should defend him in the court.

The opposition Congress, meanwhile, continued to target the BJP government in Madhya Pradesh over the incident and questioned the "silence" of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.

Bharat Soni, an auto rickshaw driver, was arrested in the case on Thursday.

“It is a shameful act. Neither have I gone to hospital to meet him, no will I go to the police station or courts. My son has committed a crime, therefore he should be hanged,” his father told reporters here.

Ujjain Bar Council president Ashok Yadav said the incident had damaged the reputation of the temple city.

"We are appealing to our members not to take up the case of the accused," he said.

Bharat Soni was arrested three days after a girl, aged about 12, was found walking on the city streets in injured condition.

Medical examination established that she had been raped.

Soni sustained injury when he allegedly tried to escape while being taken to the crime spot for investigation, police had said on Thursday. The girl is admitted to the Government Maharaja Tukojirao Holkar Women's Hospital in Indore where she underwent a major surgery on Wednesday.

A counsellor interacted with her and found that she belongs to the Satna district of MP. But she could not tell her name or address properly.

Police had said that a complaint about a girl of the same age going missing had been registered in Satna, but it was to be confirmed if the rape survivor was the same girl.

The Congress slammed the BJP government in Madhya Pradesh where assembly elections are due by the year-end.

Congress spokesperson Supriya Shrinate alleged that the law-and-order situation in the state had considerably deteriorated under Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.

"In Madhya Pradesh, being a Dalit, tribal and woman has become a sin. Madhya Pradesh is number one in rapes of minors. Fifty-eight thousand rape cases and 68,000 kidnapping cases have been reported in 18 years of his (Chouhan's) rule. But the country's prime minister, home minister and all the BJP leaders are just sitting silent," Shrinate told reporters in Delhi.

She also questioned the "silence" of Women and Child Development Minister Smriti Irani, the National Commission for Women (NCW) and the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) over the incident.

Randeep Singh Surjewala, the Congress general secretary in charge of Madhya Pradesh, claimed that the attack on this "Dalit girl" was more brutal than that on the Nirbhaya case victim.

Surjewala also visited the Holkar Women's Hospital in Indore.