A female Indian politician has sparked outrage with her comments about victims of gang rape. "Rapes take place also because of a woman's clothes, her behavior and her presence at inappropriate places," Asha Mirje, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader in western Maharashtra and a member of the state women's commission, said at a Tuesday meeting, local media reported. She also questioned whether a 23-year-old physiotherapy student, who died after being gang-raped on a bus in New Delhi, needed to go out to a movie at 11 p.m. Four men were sentenced to death last year for the attack, which sparked nationwide protests. Mirje also commented on a case of a photojournalist who was gang-raped in Mumbai last year, asking, "Why did the victim go to such an isolated spot at 6 p.m.?" Politicians and activists called for Mirje to resign or be removed from her post on the women’s commission.
