Panaji: Under pressure from the opposition to Gangrape from two small girls on the Benaulim Beach in the early hours of Sunday, Chairman of the Minister of Pramod Sawant said parents need introspection why both girls and two boys were on the beach late at night.
“When children aged 14 years live on the beach all night, parents need introspection.
Only because children do not listen, we cannot place responsibility to the government and the police,” Sawant, who also holds a home portfolio, said.
He said parents had the responsibility to ensure the safety of their children and signaled that they should not allow their children, especially minors.
“We immediately blamed the police, but I wanted to show that of the 10 young men who went to the beach for a party, four stayed on the beach all night and six left home,” he said.
“They were on the beach all night, two boys and two girls,” Sawant said replying to the call of attention in the assembly on the first day of the Monsun session on Wednesday.
Four men, one of them was a government employee (a driver with the Ministry of Agriculture), posed as a police officer and raped the two girls after beating the children at Benaulim Beach.
The four defendants were arrested Sunday night, he told the Assembly.
Sawant said that teenagers, especially children underage, should not “spend the night on the beach”.
The President’s Goa Forward President and former Deputy Minister of Vijai Sardesai slammed Sawant for trying to change errors in their children and parents.
“You can’t say why they are on the beach.
This is not the answer to the Minister of State House.
Minister of Home Affairs must say that we (Goa) are very safe so you can spend all night on the beach,” Sardesai said.