Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust (Blast), Ain o Shalish Kendra (ASK), Bangladesh Mahila Parishad (BMP), Karmojibi Nari, and eight other rights bodies said they would submit a memorandum of demands to the inspector general of police today and send a five-member fact finding mission to Chuadanga.

Farida Yeasmin of the Blast in the key briefing said rape is an offence that demands immediate arrest without any notice. But, in this case, the accused policemen have only been closed or suspended.

The speakers also alleged a vested quarter is trying to cover up the vile crime and destroy its evidence, and said the policemen involved in the outrage should be tried immediately under the Women and Children Repression Prevention Act.

BMP General Secretary Ayesha Khanam said, while the ruling party leaders repeatedly claim an improved law and order, the law enforcers make it clear there is no security for people, especially for women, in the country.

"The situation is so bleak that within a few days after the observance of International Human Rights Day and the Fortnight to Resist Violence against Women, law enforcers here gang rape a woman," she lamented. Quoting a Blast report Ayesha said in January-June 2004 police sexually abused 35 women.

Bangladesh Jatiya Sramik Jote President Shirin Akhtar, Karmojibi Nari co-Ordinator Arifa Akhtar, Rowshon Jahan Parvin of ASK, Upama Dasgupta of Samata and Hasina Akhtar of Nijera Kori were also present.