UK has 5th highest number of rapes, claims new video

London, Mar 14: Britain has the fifth highest number of rapes in the world but only one in ten rapists are convicted, according to a video made in response to the BBC's controversial documentary which was banned in India last week.

Leslee Udwin's documentary 'India's Daughter', which featured an interview with Mukesh Singh, one of five men convicted of the brutal gangrape and murder of a Delhi student in 2012, caused anger in India among nationalists who felt it had sought to tarnish the country's reputation and suggest many Indian men believed women were to blame for rape.

According to a report in The Telegraph, video-maker Harvinder Singh released 'United Kingdom's Daughter' in response to the controversial documentary to show how sexual violence is a universal problem and not unique to India.

The video begins with dramatic music and pictures of cowering, traumatised women, as subtitles highlight the scale of Britain's grim rape and sexual violence statistics.

"United Kingdom is fifth at the world's rape list," it said.

"The number of rapes is more because many do not report," it added.

"Ten per cent of women in the United Kingdom experience sexual victimisation," but "a third of Britons believe women are responsible for rape," the film claimed in a direct response to the BBC's documentary which suggested the views of a convicted gangrapist and murderer were more widely shared.

In the response video, a selection of photographs, graphic statistics and clips from another BBC documentary, the producer claimed women in Britain "don't resist the rape so killing figures are a few."

The claims made in his video reflect a widespread anger in India, especially among nationalists, who believe the BBC's India's Daughter unfairly maligned the country and made false generalisations about the attitudes of its men. Some of its claims appear to be factually incorrect.

According to official figures, 233 women are raped in Britain every day, while the conviction rate is 60 per cent -– considerably higher than India's 24 per cent but regarded as shamefully low regardless.

The film also sought to make wider criticisms of British society -– 41 per cent of marriages "broken in just 20 years" while "11 per cent population living under the poverty line" and "31 per cent of people age of 65 or more living in old age homes."

PTI