'When will Delhi wake up?' Violence against women and children in India increases with more toddler gang-rape

'Delhi is not safe and secure for women.'

India continues to experience a surge in violence against women and children as two young girls were abducted and gang-raped during separate attacks.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - The two girls from New Delhi, a two-and-a-half-year-old and a five-year-old, were both kidnapped and later found with devastating wounds to their bodies. The two-and-a-half-year-old was reportedly taken from a religious event by two men and raped before being dumped on the streets near her home. The five-year-old was lured out of her home by three men, and then raped by all of three of them.

Outraged and scared, a crowd of over 100 people from New Delhi gathered near the two-and-a-half-year-old's home to harshly criticize the police over the failure to make any definitive arrests in the horrifying case.

"They (police) are not doing anything to arrest the rapists. We don't feel safe in this city and there will be a day when parents will stop giving birth to girls fearing they will be raped," an anonymous female relative of the girl told reporters, according to AFP.

In 2014, India recorded 36,735 rape cases, with 2,096 of them in Delhi.

"Most of these incidents have been reported in lower income areas like slums and densely populated areas, where mostly migrants stay. These men live in crammed spaces with no social or parental control and usually no fear of law," explained Ranjana Kumari, head of Delhi-based Centre for Social Research. "Delhi is not safe and secure for women and the situation is deteriorating."

According to Pushpendra Kumar, West Delhi police chief, a manhunt has been launched to find the suspects involved in the toddler's abduction and rape, and the three men involved in the five-year-old's attack have been arrested, after locals caught the men.

These two attacks come only eight days after a similar one involving a four-year-old girl who was allegedly raped and cut up with a blade before being abandoned by her attackers on a railroad track in New Delhi. A 25-year-old man was arrested for that attack.

"When will Delhi wake up? Till when will girls continue to be brutalized in Indian capital. Gangrape of 2.5 year n 5 year old. Shameful," Delhi Commission for Women chairwoman, Swati Maliwal tweeted, according to AFP.

"Repeated rape of minors is shameful and worrying. Delhi police has completely failed to provide safety. What are PM n his LG (lieutenant governor) doing?," Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted before heading to meet the victims in hospital, putting a lot of the blame on Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Modi's central government controls Delhi's 84,000 member police force, according to AFP, and the ongoing "turf war" between the two governments in Delhi are leaving the area vulnerable.

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