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The child was attacked by the group while waiting for treatment for a snake bite in a hospital near Lucknow in the northern province of Uttar Pradesh. Police are investigating the incident after she told her grandmother of the ordeal on Saturday night. Local police official Mahesh Srivastava confirmed that one man was in custody but officers were still hunting for four other people.

Investigators have demanded CCTV footage from the hospital to find out why she was left alone. Mr Srivastava said the girl had been in hospital 150 miles southwest of Lucknow for four days before the attack. The incident is the latest in a series of high-profile sexual assaults to shock India over the last few years which has seen widespread protests against violence towards women.

Women in India demand justice over gang rape in India in September this year

Earlier this year, the Indian government passed laws which carry a more severe punishments for those convicted of rape, including 20 year prison sentences and the death penalty for rape of a child under age 12. In 2012, the country was rocked by the gang-rape and murder of a student on a bus in New Delhi which sparked a backlash and galvanised women into speaking out against sexual assaults. However despite the increasing rallies and more serious laws, sexual assaults are still common in a country where violence against women and children is quietly accepted. In August this year a nine-year-old girl was raped at a private school in Vashi and in September a 19-year-old student was abducted and raped by three men while on her way home from a tuition class in Haryana.

Parents protest outside a school in Vashi where a nine-year-old girl was rape in August 2018