Police have arrested three men over the suspected rape and murder of a teenager who had protested against village elders' harassment of her father in India's east, an officer said Wednesday. 
 
 The father of the 16-year-old said she went missing after trying to save him from being attacked by village elders as punishment for failing to repay a loan, according to the officer. 
 
 Elders of the village council in West Bengal state instead turned on the girl on Monday night and demanded she lick spittle off the ground, the NDTV network quoted villagers as saying. 
 
 The girl had begged the elders not to thrash her father, who had been brought before them over the loan to borrow a tractor, local media reported. 
 
 Village elders still hold huge sway in deeply impoverished Indian villages and often act as a parallel legal system, settling disputes and handing down judgements. 
 
 "Police arrested three people after the girl's father lodged a complaint that she was raped and murdered," additional superintendent of police James Kujur told AFP. 
 
 "Her father named 13 persons in the complaint. We are investigating the case," said Kujur, who visited the crime scene in Jalpaiguri district. 
 
 "The girl went missing after she protested at the village council, who had called her father asking him to settle his dues for hiring a power tiller from a villager." 
 
 Police said the girl's body, discovered on Tuesday morning, has been sent for post mortem examination as police attempt to unravel yet another case of suspected sexual violence. 
 
 India introduced tougher laws to deter rapists following public outrage over the 2012 fatal gang-rape of a student on a moving bus in New Delhi. 
 
 But attacks against women have continued unabated in many parts of the country. 
 
 Police found the girl's body on railway tracks near her home in Dhupguri village 680 kilometres (422 miles) north of Kolkata. 
 
 They have arrested three members of the village council for questioning but no charges have been laid. 
 
 Council elders told local media they were not involved in the girl's death and said they had not assaulted the father. 
 
 str-tha/cc/sm 

 Image copyright AFP Image caption Scrutiny of sexual violence in India has grown since the 2012 gang rape and murder of a student on a Delhi bus 
 
 The semi-naked body of a teenage girl who was allegedly humiliated by village elders for protesting against her father's harassment has been found near a railway track in eastern India. 
 
 Police suspect the 15-year-old girl in West Bengal was raped and murdered. 
 
 Her family said she was made to spit on the ground and lick it up - an act considered a grave form of humiliation. 
 
 Unofficial courts in India's villages often sanction punishment of residents deemed to have violated local codes. 
 
 Scrutiny of sexual violence in India has grown since the 2012 gang rape and murder of a student on a Delhi bus. 
 
 The government tightened laws on sexual violence last year after widespread protests following the attack, but violence and discrimination against women remain deeply entrenched. 
 
 The BBC's Amitabha Bhattasali in Calcutta says the girl's body was found near a railway track in the state's Jalpaiguri district on Tuesday - a day after a village court had summoned her and her farmer father to settle a dispute over a tractor. 
 
 Her family members told the police that the elders "threatened the girl with dire consequences" when she protested against the "harassment of her father" by the village court. 
 
 Villagers said the girl "disappeared" when the court was in progress, and her body was found the next morning. 
 
 Police said the girl's family had lodged a complaint against 13 people in the village. No arrests have been made yet. 
 
 Local villagers said political rivalry between the village elders and the girl's family could have led to an escalation of the dispute - the elders are reported to be supporters of the ruling Trinamul Congress party, while the girl's family reportedly supports the state's main opposition Communist Party of India (Marxist). 
 
 Earlier this year, a woman in West Bengal's Birbhum district was gang-raped, allegedly on orders of village elders who objected to her relationship with a man. 
 
 In 2010, village elders in Birbhum ordered at least three tribal women to strip and walk naked in front of large crowds, police said. 
 
 The women were being punished for "having close relations" with men from other communities.
– Another suspected rape and murder of a teenage girl in India, this time a 15-year-old who had the nerve to question village elders about the treatment of her father. As Euro News reports, the elders in the Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal summoned the father over his failure to repay a loan. When the girl tried to intervene to prevent him from being beaten, the elders ordered her to spit on the ground and lick it up, and threatened her with "dire consequences," family members tell the BBC. Her semi-clothed body was found the next day on railroad tracks near her village, and police suspect she had been gang-raped before being killed. Autopsy results are pending. Three men have been arrested, though no charges have been filed yet, reports AFP. The news agency explains that village elders act as a sort of "parallel legal system" in parts of rural India. In July, a girl was ordered raped in retaliation for something her brother had done.