Mob beats woman, burns her home then parades her naked through streets in India

Officers later took her into custody and had to open fire to disperse mob

A woman has been stripped naked, dragged from her home and paraded through the streets in the latest incident of mob violence in India.

The woman had been suspected of involvement in a murder, after a 19-year-old man was found dead on railway tracks in the small town of Bihiyar, in eastern Bihar state. Men travelled to Bihiyar from the man’s village and, rather than alerting the authorities, broke into the woman’s home while also burning houses and vehicles in the red-light district where she lived.

Police were reportedly only alerted to the situation when they saw videos circulating on WhatsApp of the woman being beaten. She has since been arrested, along with 15 men accused of being involved in the mob violence, and seven police officers have been suspended for failing to act sooner.

According to The Hindu, the incident started when a teen named Vimlesh Shah was found dead on Monday morning. Members of his community in Damodarpur village said his body showed signs of strangulation, and that he had been dumped on the railway line in an attempt to cover up the killing.

It’s not clear what led them to suspect the involvement of the woman living nearby but, despite her pleading innocence, a mob thrashed and paraded her naked in front of a large crowd.

Officers later took her into custody and had to open fire to disperse the mob.

Police told BBC Hindi the woman was receiving treatment in a local hospital. They said they were still investigating the circumstances surrounding the 19-year-old’s death, and awaited a post-mortem report.

A number of videos of the incident appear to be circulating on social media, including one which shows the naked woman being paraded, surrounded by dozens of men.

​Tejashwi Yadav, leader of the opposition in Bihar state, condemned what he called the chief minister’s failure to maintain “law and order, [and] ensure women’s safety and security”.

“I’m speechless & numb to see the heart wrenching videos of that women,” he said, referring to Bihar as a “lawless state”.

News of the incident emerged on the same day as WhatsApp’s chief executive officer, Chris Daniels, held a meeting in Delhi with India's IT minister to discuss the messaging app’s growing role in mob violence.

While there were no suggestions that WhatsApp was used to spread false rumours in the lead up to the Bihar incident, it did show how the app - which has more than 200m users in India - could also be used by mobs to heap further shame on their victims.

Mr Daniels pledged on Tuesday to develop tools that would combat fake messages, and thereby help the government crack down on people whipping up public anger through mass message forwards on social media, Indian officials said.

The IT minister, Shankar Prasad, said WhatsApp was working with law enforcement agencies to tackle the problem and was planning a big campaign to educate consumers about fake messages.