Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday attacked the BJP over the alleged kidnapping and murder of two Dalit girls in Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur Kheri, saying women's security cannot be expected from those facilitating the release of rapists. The two teenage sisters were found hanging from a tree in a sugarcane field located about a kilometre away from their house in Nighasan police station limits in Lakhimpur Kheri on Wednesday, police said. Six people were arrested on Thursday in connection with the rape and murder of the two girls.

"The kidnapping and murder of two minor Dalit sisters in Lakhimpur in broad daylight is a very disturbing incident," Gandhi said in a tweet in Hindi. "Women's safety cannot be expected from those facilitating the release of rapists and welcoming them," the former Congress chief said in an apparent reference to 11 convicts in the Bilkis Bano gangrape case being set free last month from the Godhra sub-jail after the BJP-led Gujarat government allowed their release under its remission policy. Gandhi stressed on the need for creating a safe environment in the country for women. As soon as the news about the alleged murder of the Dalit girls broke, Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra attacked the BJP-led Uttar Pradesh government over "increasing" crimes against women in the state.