Five men have been sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty of a horrific gang rape. The judge described the attack as “one of the most heinous and inhumane crimes known to society”, as he handed down the sentences.

The sexual assault shocked an entire nation and the world back when it hit the headlines in 2016. A criminal gang stopped the family car as it drove along on a busy highway in Uttar Pradesh state, some 65 kilometres (40 miles) south of New Delhi, and forced everyone inside to get out. They dragged them to a nearby field and took their cash, jewellery and mobile phones, before they tied up the male members of the family.

The gang then took it in turns to rape the mother and her 13-year-old daughter.

The judge – Om Prakash Verma – noted: “Rape is mot merely an assault – it completely destroys the victim’s entire personality.

“A rapist not only attacks the victim’s privacy and personal liberty but also causes severe psychological and physical trauma as a result of the crime.

“There is a strong possibility slitty that the victim may suffer from depression in the future as her life becomes bleak and dark. It is difficult even to imagine whether this young girl (now 22) will ever be able to recover from this appalling incident.”

The judge added there was no reason at all to show leniency to the defendants who had acted “with inhumanity and brutality”.

Following the gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old in 2012, India’s government brought in sweeping changes to the criminal justice system, including tougher sentences.

Around the time of the 2012 attack, police were recording up to 25,000 rape cases a year across India, according to data from the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB).

Since then, the annual number has largely remained above 30,000, barring the COVID-19 pandemic year of 2020, which saw a sharp fall.

Attacks peaked at nearly 39,000 in 2016. In 2018, on average one woman reported a rape every 15 minutes across the country, according to a government report.

There were more than 31,000 reported rapes in 2022, the latest year for which data is available.