The Uttar Pradesh government in the Supreme Court over the dead-of-night cremation of Hathras alleged gang rape victim told that the body was cremated in the middle of the night “to avoid large-scale violence” the next morning.

As reported by NDTV, in an affidavit to the Supreme Court, the UP government also justified the 2.30 am cremation saying there was a high alert in the district because of the Babri mosque verdict a day later.

“The district administration at Hathras had been receiving several intelligence inputs since morning of September 29 of the manner in which the dharna had taken place at Safdarjung hospital and the whole issue was being exploited and a caste/communal colour was being given”, it said.

It further said that it had received specific inputs that lakhs of protesters “of both communities/castes” along with supporters of political parties and the media would assemble the next morning at the village, “which is likely to turn violent and will lead to major law and order problems.”

“There was also an alert because of the Babri mosque verdict and coronavirus safety rules,” said the affidavit.

“In such extraordinary and severe circumstances, the district administration took the decision to convince the parents of the deceased to cremate her with all religious rites at night to avoid large scale violence in the morning to cremate the body of the victim that was lying for almost more than 20 hours after her death and post-mortem,” it added.

The UP government told the apex court that once the post-mortem had been done, there cannot be any bad intention to speed up the cremation except to obviate the potential violent situation resulting from the planned caste divide by certain vested interests.

In a separate development, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the alleged gang rape and torture of the 20-year-old Dalit woman has reached Hathras this morning and began the probe.

As per the reports, the SIT will submit its final report over the case to the Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath tomorrow.

The team is headed by UP Home Secretary Bhagwan Swaroop, Deputy Inspector General of Police Chandraprakash and IPS officer Poonam.

The 20-year-old girl had succumbed to her injuries on Tuesday night as Safdarjung hospital and her dead-of-night cremation has sparked nation wide protest.