Indian men strip to catch rapist

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/world/south_asia/6988959.stm

Version 0 of 1.

Every man in an Indian village was made to strip to his underwear and inspected by village leaders investigating the rape and murder of a woman.

Members of the Boraj village council in Rajasthan state inspected the bodies of around 100 men and boys to see if anyone had signs of a violent struggle.

The exercise was undertaken after the body of a 35-year-old woman was found.

But the investigation did not find any marks to connect any of the men with the crime.

"All the men took off their clothes voluntarily so that they can be cleared of any suspicion," Tara Rawat, a village resident, told the BBC.

Anger

Mr Rawat said the entire village was angry and upset when the body of a married woman was found on Saturday night.

After it was revealed that the woman had been raped before being killed, the village council ordered all the men to strip.

The investigation failed to find any clues

"We wanted to know if anyone from our village was involved in the crime," Mr Rawat said.

Senior police officer, Lalit Maheshwari, told the BBC that the police were doing their own investigation.

"We know there was a lot of anger in the village about the crime, but we are not aware of any village council order about asking men to strip. If any law has been broken, we will take action against them," he said.

The BBC Hindi service correspondent in Jaipur, Narayan Bareth, says such panchayats (councils) are not uncommon in Rajasthan.

One such village council investigating a robbery forced many people to dip their hands in hot oil.

Human rights activists are demanding a ban on such panchayats.