Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra Friday said atrocities against women in West Bengal, Bihar, Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh have shaken the country, and asserted that repeated leniency in cases, political protection to accused and granting of bail or parole to convicts let down women.

When government statistics show 86 rapes taking place every day, from whom should women expect protection? she posed in a post in Hindi on 'X'.

"Atrocities against women in Kolkata, Bihar, Uttarakhand and UP have shaken the entire country. At this time, women across the country are in grief and anger," Priyanka Gandhi said on X.

The Congress general secretary's remarks come amid nationwide outrage over the rape and murder of a woman trainee doctor in the state-run RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata last week.

Also, a nurse of a private hospital in Uttarakhand's Rudrapur has been allegedly raped and killed with her face crushed with a stone by the accused who dumped her body in a vacant plot in a Uttar Pradesh village near the Uttarakhand border.

A 14-year-old Dalit girl was allegedly kidnapped from her house in Muzaffarpur district of Bihar and her body was found, with injury marks all over, in a pond.

"Whenever such incidents happen, the women of the country see what the governments are doing. How serious are their words and measures? Wherever there was a need to send a strong message about the safety of women, efforts were made to save the accused," Priyanka Gandhi said.

"Repeated leniency in cases of heinous atrocities on women, political protection to the accused and actions like granting bail/parole to convicted prisoners let down women," she said.

"What message does this send to the women of the country? When government statistics show 86 rapes taking place every day, from whom should women expect protection?" Gandhi asked.

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