Five persons have been arrested so far for attacking a 21-year-old Tanzanian woman in Bengaluru. The victim was allegedly dragged out of a car, beaten and stripped in Bengaluru by a mob on Sunday.
The arrests came after External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj tweeted about the incident on Wednesday and said that she had sought action against the accused:
Meanwhile the home minister of the state had a pretty unusual response to the incident, claiming that it was not a racial attack.
“This is not a racist attack, this is just a response to an accident,” G Parmeshwara, the state’s home minister said in a press conference.
Karnataka DGP Om Prakash also dismissed reports of the Tanzanian girl being stripped and paraded.
According to news reports, the Tanzanian woman, who was travelling with her three friends, was dragged out of a car near the spot where a drunk Sudanese driver had run over a woman 30 minutes earlier. The accident had killed the woman on the spot and left her husband injured.
She has complained that she was stripped and assaulted by the mob.
Meanwhile, Tanzania ambassador to India, John WH Kijazi speaking to ANI has said that there is an element of mob justice and racism in this attack.
Earlier on Thursday, Senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh tweeted that Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi has sought a report on this incident.