Indian Politician Says Women Who Have Sex (Rape Or Not) Before Marriage Should Be Hanged

In full national election season, a top Indian politician sparked global outrage by arguing that women who have sex before marriage should be hanged.


Abu Azmi, of India’s Socialist Party, told a reporter last week that women who had premarital sex should be sentenced to death, even if they were raped. “If rape happens with or without consent, it should be punished as prescribed in Islam,” Azmi said, according to the Mid-Day website. “The solution is this: Any woman, whether married or unmarried, who goes along with a man, with or without her consent, should be hanged. Both should be hanged. It shouldn’t be allowed even if a woman goes by consent.”

Azmi made the remarks in response to comments by his party chief, Mulayam Singh Yadav, who had argued during an election rally on Thursday that the death penalty for rape is unfair as “boys make mistakes.”

“If boys and girls have difference, and the girl goes and gives a statement that ‘I have been raped,’ then the poor fellows are punished,” Yadav said, according to DNA India.