India gang rapes: Outrage over police 'discrimination'

There is outrage over police inaction in a village in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh where two teenage girls were gang-raped and hanged from a tree, the BBC reported.

The father of one victim says he was ridiculed by police when he sought help in finding his missing daughter.

He said that when policemen found out he was from a lower caste, they "refused to look for my girl."

At least three men, including one policeman, have been arrested in connection with the incident.

Relativesz have complained that police refused to help find the missing girls, aged 14 and 16, who were cousins from a low caste.

"When I went to the police station, the first thing I was asked was my caste. When I told them what my caste was, they started abusing me," the father of one of the girls told the BBC.

Divisions between India's castes run deep. Violence is often used by upper castes to instil fear in lower castes.

Although both the victim and the accused belonged to a caste grouping known as 'Other Backward Classes', the victims were lower in that hierarchy.

The victims had apparently gone out to relieve themselves as they had no toilet at home.

Campaigners have highlighted the lack of sanitation in rural areas as being a risk to women's security as well as their health, as they are often attacked when having to go out to go the toilet, particularly at night.