Maharashtra: Eight men have been arrested in India for the rape of a 16-year-old girl who was held for more than 12 hours in a bungalow in Palghar, in the state of Maharashtra, Police said.  According to the complaint, one of the men allegedly lured the teenager on Friday to the bungalow, located on the coast, where she was raped consecutively until the following morning: "The complaint filed on Saturday shows that the victim states that the assault began at 8 p.m. on December 16 and continued until 11 a.m. the following day," explained a police spokesman quoted by the Indian channel NDTV.

 

"The accused took her to an empty bungalow and raped her in turns. Then they took her to the shore and abused her again," he added. Sex crimes and rape in India have been in the public spotlight for years, especially since the brutal rape and murder of a young student on a New Delhi bus in December 2012.

 

According to a 2019 National Crime Records Bureau report, more than 30,000 rapes are committed in the country each year, about 88 a day. The executions of those responsible for the rape of the young woman in New Delhi, according to the bureau, "have had no effect" on the criminals. Impunity is notorious: only 30 percent of reported rapes result in convictions, and the socio-cultural stigma attached to the victims prevents most cases from coming to light.