Hathras Gangrape Case: UP Government justifies 2:30 am cremation of the victim to the Supreme Court

The government said, “her rites were performed with all required customs at the night.”

Today, the Uttar Pradesh government in an affidavit to the apex court rationalised that why the Hathras victim was cremated in the middle of the night. It emphasised that the 2:30 am cremation was “to avoid large-scale violence” the next morning, citing intelligence inputs of “major law and order problems” and because of the Babri mosque verdict the next day. 

“The district administration at Hathras received intelligence inputs that cause of the dharna which had taken place at Safdarjung hospital situations could turn haywire and the whole issue was being exploited and a caste/communal colour was being given”, said the Yogi government. It claimed that it had inputs, lakhs of protestors from different castes and political parties could have turned “violent” causing major law and order issues.

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The government said, “her rites were performed with all required customs at the night.”

So the district administration took the decision to convince the parents of the deceased victim to cremate her with all religious rites at the middle of the night to avoid large scale violence in the morning and the body was lying for almost more than 20 hours after her death and post-mortem,” said the Uttar Pradesh government.

“After the post-mortem was done,  there could not be any bad intention to speed up the cremation except to obviate the potential violent situation” The UP affidavit also accuses vested interest of spreading a bogus narrative.

A Special Investigation Team (SIT) was set up for a probe in the case and the state has already suggested a CBI probe.