Arun Jaitley stirs anger by making light of Delhi rape case
Finance and Defence Minister Arun Jaitley speaks during a news conference in Srinagar June 15, 2014.
NEW DELHI
(Reuters) - Finance Minister Arun Jaitley faced criticism on Friday for making light of the gang rape of a Delhi woman in 2012 and her subsequent death by saying it was a small incident that had cost India billions of dollars in tourism.
Jaitley, who is also defence minister and a key lieutenant of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, denied he was trying to lessen the magnitude of the crime which shook the country and turned the spotlight on women's safety.
"I am sensitive to these issues myself, no question of trivialising any incident," he said after his comments sparked outrage including from the victim's mother, who said politicians had a tendency to forget.
Five men and a teenager lured the 23-year-old physiotherapist and a male friend into an unlicensed bus and repeatedly raped and tortured her. She later died of her injuries, provoking an outpouring of anger and soul-searching about the place of women in Indian society.
Four men have been sentenced to death while a fifth suspect committed suicide. The teenager was remanded to a judicial reform centre.
While laws relating to assault on women have since been toughened, the crime also exposed social attitudes in a country where the victim has often ended up being found responsible.
Jaitley, addressing a conference of state tourism ministers, said improving law and order was necessary to help bring visitors to India.
"One small incident of rape in Delhi advertised world over is enough to cost us billions of dollars in terms of global tourism," he said.
The assault and several similar attacks in Delhi and around the country have helped reinforce the image of India as unsafe for women visitors.
About 50 members of the youth wing of the main opposition Congress shouted slogans against Jaitley outside the office of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
The victim's mother said the government minister's remarks had hurt her greatly.
"When they needed votes, they would take my daughter's name and that such a big incident had happened. But once they got into power, they call it a small thing."
(Reporting by Sanjeev Miglani and Rajesh Kumar Singh; Editing by Nick Macfie)
Indians keep faith with Modi, best hope for economy - poll
Prime Minister Narendra Modi waves as he leaves after the commissioning ceremony of warship, INS Kolkata at a naval base in Mumbai August 16, 2014.
NEW DELHI
(Reuters) - More than 70 percent of Indians are satisfied with the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi since he took office nearly three months ago, an opinion poll showed, seeing in him the best hope to put the economy back on track.
The 'Mood of the Nation Poll' by India Today-Hansa Research stands out in contrast with the disappointment that top political economists, including those who advised the Modi campaign, have voiced over his failure to announce big bang reforms.
The poll of 12,430 people conducted across India found that support for Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party had increased since it won the biggest election mandate in three decades.
The vote share of the BJP and its allies would jump to 40 percent from 31 percent if a fresh election were held now, the survey showed, in a break from tradition in India's volatile politics where discontent with incumbent governments quickly sets in, especially when expectations are high.
After assuming power, Modi has repeatedly vowed to fire up the bureaucracy by cutting red tape and curbing corruption, as his government attempts to revive Asia's third-largest economy from its longest phase of sub-par growth in decades.
While some visible signs of recovery have emerged, Modi has not announced any sweeping market reforms, with critics saying he has scored high on oratory but low on delivery of his election campaign promises.
But 65 percent of those surveyed believed Modi will put the economy back on track in six months and that his party was the best bet for development.
"As the 100-day mark of the government draws near, the nation thinks that Narendra Modi is keeping his word, and would vote in a saffron-led government with even more lawmakers than it did during the May elections," Mail Today, a group newspaper, said on the findings of the survey.
LESS DIVISIVE
Modi has also turned out be a far less divisive figure than his political rivals had warned and hardline elements on the Hindu right had been firmly kept in check, according to the poll.
The BJP strongman has been dogged for years by allegations that he didn't do enough to protect minority Muslims when Hindu mobs went on a rampage in 2002 in Gujarat that he governed after a train carrying Hindu pilgrims was set on fire.
Modi has denied the allegations and a Supreme Court-ordered investigation absolved him of any responsibility for the violence in which more than 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, were killed.
Even among Muslims, Modi's standing had improved with only 9 percent seeing him as representing Hindu interests, down from 22 percent in January, the poll said.
It said the survey was carried out in 108 seats out of the 543 at stake in the Lok Sabha and that interviews were conducted face-to-face.
But polls in India have a mixed record with many often getting election results in the world's biggest democracy wrong. An exit poll for the May elections conducted by the same research organisation, Hansa, in collaboration with news channel NDTV, under-estimated the scale of the BJP victory.
(Reporting by Aditya Kalra; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
