AGRA / AGENCIES
Union Minister Uma Bharti told a large crowd while campaigning in Uttar Pradesh on Thursday that she made rapists "beg for forgiveness" when she was Chief Minister.
"Rapists should be tortured in front of victims untill they beg for forgiveness. When I was the CM (Chief Minister), I made them do it," she said in Agra.
The minister made the comments in reference to the gang-rape last year of a mother and her teen daughter travelling on the highway in Bulandshahr near Delhi with their family. She ripped into the state's Samajwadi Party government, saying it never tried to stop the release on bail of those arrested for the horrific incident.
She also recommended, in graphic detail, ways of making rapists beg for their lives - "They should be hung upside down and salt and chilly should be rubbed on their wounds until they scream. Mothers and sisters should watch so they can get closure."
The 57-year-old veteran BJP leader and minister went on to describe how she put her beliefs into practice when she was Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh over a decade ago.
"I would tell the cops to hang the rapists upside down and beat them so hard that they would cry out. I would tell women to watch through windows of the police station," she said.
When a police officer objected, she shared, "I told him people who behave like 'danav' (demons) cannot have Manavadhikar (human rights). Their heads should be cut off like Ravana's."
Uma Bharati, who is Water Resources Minister in the central government, is known for her intemperate pronouncements.
Recently, she commented that those who doubted the Army's surgical strikes across the Line of Control in September should go to Pakistan.
