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Mulayam on rape: Boys make mistakes, why hang them?

In highly controversial remarks, Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav on Thursday said there was a need to change the anti-rape laws as "boys commit mistakes" for which they should not be hanged. 

"Ladke, ladke hain. Galti ho jati hai (Boys are boys. They commit mistakes)," he said at an election rally in Moradabad.

Is rape a 'mistake'? BOO Mulayam Singh

Citing the recent example of a court sentencing three men found guilty of gang-raping two women in the abandoned Shakti Mills in Mumbai last year, he said there was a need to change the new rape law which provides for death sentence to repeat rape offenders.

"Efforts will be made to change such a law, so that those misusing it are punished. Those filing false reports will also be taken to task," he said.

Yadav said boys and girls fall in love but due to differences they fall apart later on. "When their friendship ends, the girl complains she has been raped," he said, stressing the need for changes in the anti-rape law.

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