Dera Sach Khand has gained many followers from the dalit community in Punjab and is opposed by many mainstream Sikhs.

INDIA'S PARLIAMENT yesterday elected its first woman speaker, who is also a member of the formerly untouchable, low-caste Dalit community.

Local police said a post-mortem confirmed that the girls, from the Dalit community, had been raped and died from the hanging.

The girls involved are usually from the lower-caste Dalit community, have little or no land, and live in drought-prone areas, one report said.

Shivaji Nagar is a government-planned resettlement colony where poor Muslim and Dalit communities from slums in the city at large were relocated in the 1980s.