As the assault and molestation of two teenagers by a group of men in Bihar’s Jamui led to national outrage, JDU state president Umesh Kushwaha</strong> Monday said the state government is sensitive to any “isolated incident (chutput ghatna)” that takes place, and people should recall the time before 2005, when the RJD was in power and people were afraid of stepping out of their homes.

The JDU-BJP coalition is in power in the state.

“Whenever such an isolated incident occurs, our government is sensitive to it. But look at the period before 2005, what kind of Bihar was it? Could people even step out of their homes? What kind of Bihar was it, and what was the situation? People were somehow struggling through their lives. Today, at least when such an incident occurs, the administration is taking action and responding. Whoever has committed this incident, no matter how big a criminal they may be, will soon be taken into police custody,” he said.


Congress’s Rahul Gandhi called the video “deeply disturbing”. “Two students were stopped on a road. Harassed. Humiliated. Molested. A young girl, hands folded, begged to be let go while goons groped her and dragged her away,” he posted on X. “Who gave these men the right to behave like this? This is not ‘culture.’ It is patriarchy: the belief that any man can police a girl’s body, her movement, her choices. When control is mistaken for culture, and such attitudes are normalised by Andhbhakts, mobs start believing they are the law.”

“Every individual in that video must be identified and prosecuted under POCSO, and justice must be swift. And if the incident happened on September 19th, why are the culprits not behind bars yet? And the Bihar government must answer why a girl is not safe on a public road at 7 pm?” he wrote.

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Opposition RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav said that “anarchy has broken out in Bihar” and “no female student or woman is safe anywhere, anytime”.

“The Prime Minister, who promised women Rs 10,000 in cash and Rs 2 lakh more after the elections, has turned into a silent sage on such incidents. Under the NDA government, there has been an unprecedented increase in atrocities against women, students, the poor, and Dalits,” he posted on X.