SRINAGAR: Jammu-based lawyer Deepika Pushkar Nath, who represented the family of the eight-year-old victim in the 2018 Kathua rape and murder case, has alleged that her security has been downgraded despite persistent threats, forcing her to stop her daughter from attending school.
Speaking to TNIE, Deepika said that about three months ago, one of the two PSOs assigned to her was withdrawn by the police. She had originally been provided security after facing open threats for taking up the high-profile case.
She said that in November 2025, she approached the IGP (Security) seeking replacement of one PSO. “Instead of replacing the PSO, it was withdrawn, leaving me with only one,” she said, adding that repeated representations to police officials, including a recent meeting with the IGP, yielded no result.
Deepika said she has faced continued threats and even attacks since representing the victim’s family. Referring to Farooq Abdullah, she remarked, “When someone like Farooq Abdullah can survive an assassination attempt despite Z+ security, what does it mean for someone like me?”
She said earlier one PSO accompanied her daughter, a Class 8 student, to school, while the other stayed with her. “Since the security was scaled down, I am not sending my daughter to school out of fear. She only went to appear for exams,” she said, adding that she fears sending her alone or with strangers.
The lawyer, who briefly joined and later returned to the Indian National Congress, said she has faced social and professional isolation since the Rasana case.
“If anything happens to me or my family, the responsibility lies with the IGP Jammu Security. There are no proper SOPs for threat assessment,” she said, adding that she has written to the Chief Justice of India and the Chief Justice of the J&K High Court seeking intervention.
In her letter, she stated that since 2018 she has faced organised hate campaigns, public vilification and protests for standing with a victim of sexual violence. She urged the court to take cognisance of the “arbitrary withdrawal” of her security and direct its immediate restoration.
Deepika said she would move the J&K High Court if her full security cover is not reinstated.