DHAKA: Shops and schools in a town in eastern India where an elderly nun was gang-raped closed March 17 in protest over perceived police inaction, as anger mounts over the ‘inhuman’ crime.

Business owners said, Turkish daily Hurriyet reports.

Police have detained around 10 people for questioning but no arrests have been made over the Friday attack on the nun, aged in her 70s, the latest in a string of high-profile rapes in India.

The nun was attacked after a gang of half a dozen robbers broke into a convent school near the town of Ranaghat in West Bengal state and ransacked the premises, police say.
     
‘We have called for the shutdown of businesses and shops in this town to support the nun ... and the immediate arrest of the culprits,’ said Samiran Paul, a spokesman for the local business association.

‘We can’t imagine such inhuman torture on an elderly nun who devoted her life to the service of humanity. It’s a shame to us,’ the cloth merchant told the media.

India Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday expressed deep concern over the attack, along with a separate incident of vandalism of a partly built church in the northern state of Haryana on Sunday.

‘PMO (prime minister’s office) has asked for immediate report on facts & action taken regarding the incidents,’ he said in a tweet.

A series of attacks on churches in recent months prompted Hindu nationalist Modi to promise a crackdown on religious violence and freedom of worship for all faiths.

BDST: 1644 HRS, MAR 17, 2015