The 23-year-old whose savage gangrape on
a bus in New Delhi sparked mass protests across the country died on
Saturday in a Singapore hospital after suffering severe organ failure.
As authorities braced for more unrest on
the streets, police reinforcements could be seen fanning out across the
centre of New Delhi ahead of the return of her body later in the day.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh led the tributes to the victim but urged protesters to channel their anger constructively.
According to doctors in Singapore, the student lost her fight for life at 4:45am (2045 GMT), nearly two weeks after the brutal attack that horrified India.
"She had suffered from severe organ failure following serious injuries to her body and brain," Kelvin Loh, the chief executive of Singapore's Mount Elizabeth Hospital, said in a statement.
"She was courageous in fighting for her life for so long against the odds but the trauma to her body was too severe for her to overcome."
After boarding a bus with tinted windows on December 16, the student was attacked by six drunk men who took it in turns to rape her and assaulted her with an iron bar before throwing her and her male companion off the moving vehicle.
She was airlifted to hospital in Singapore on Thursday.
Singh said he was deeply saddened by the death and that protests sparked by the case were "understandable".
"We have already seen the emotions and energies this incident has generated," he wrote on his website.
"These are perfectly understandable reactions from a young India and an India that genuinely desires change."
Television news channels carried blanket coverage of the news, with the NDTV network running a ticker-tape headline "RIP India's Daughter".
India's High Commissioner to Singapore TCA Raghavan told reporters that the woman's family was "shattered" by her death.
Her body was carried out of the hospital in a black bag by three workers, who placed it into a police van, after which it was driven to a morgue.
The body will be embalmed then released to her family in the afternoon, said workers at funeral parlour Hindu Casket.
Raghavan said her body would be flown back to India later Saturday.
The decision to fly her out of India by air ambulance was taken at a meeting of Singh's cabinet on Wednesday and the government had promised to pay all her medical bills.
Home minister Sushilkumar Shinde said the government's only concern was to ensure the victim received "the best treatment possible".
Singh has ordered an official inquiry into the gangrape and new laws to protect women as well as stiffer penalties for the worst sex crimes.
And he said Delhi police would soon launch a drive to recruit more female officers as a confidence-building measure.
The government has also announced plans to post the photos, names and addresses of convicted rapists on official websites to publicly shame them.
The campaign will begin in Delhi, which has been dubbed India's "rape capital".
The Delhi gangrape has shone the spotlight on a crime that occurs on a daily basis in India, with most such assaults taking place in rural areas.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government has been battling criticism that it was tone-deaf to the outcry and heavy handed in its response to the protests in the Indian capital.
"It is deeply saddening and just beyond words. The police and government definitely have to do something more," said Sharanya Ramachandran, an Indian national working as an engineer in Singapore.
"They should bring in very severe punishment for such cases. They should start recognising that it is a big crime."
"Significant brain injuries"
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh led the tributes to the victim but urged protesters to channel their anger constructively.
According to doctors in Singapore, the student lost her fight for life at 4:45am (2045 GMT), nearly two weeks after the brutal attack that horrified India.
"She had suffered from severe organ failure following serious injuries to her body and brain," Kelvin Loh, the chief executive of Singapore's Mount Elizabeth Hospital, said in a statement.
"She was courageous in fighting for her life for so long against the odds but the trauma to her body was too severe for her to overcome."
After boarding a bus with tinted windows on December 16, the student was attacked by six drunk men who took it in turns to rape her and assaulted her with an iron bar before throwing her and her male companion off the moving vehicle.
She was airlifted to hospital in Singapore on Thursday.
Singh said he was deeply saddened by the death and that protests sparked by the case were "understandable".
"We have already seen the emotions and energies this incident has generated," he wrote on his website.
"These are perfectly understandable reactions from a young India and an India that genuinely desires change."
Television news channels carried blanket coverage of the news, with the NDTV network running a ticker-tape headline "RIP India's Daughter".
India's High Commissioner to Singapore TCA Raghavan told reporters that the woman's family was "shattered" by her death.
Her body was carried out of the hospital in a black bag by three workers, who placed it into a police van, after which it was driven to a morgue.
The body will be embalmed then released to her family in the afternoon, said workers at funeral parlour Hindu Casket.
Raghavan said her body would be flown back to India later Saturday.
The decision to fly her out of India by air ambulance was taken at a meeting of Singh's cabinet on Wednesday and the government had promised to pay all her medical bills.
Home minister Sushilkumar Shinde said the government's only concern was to ensure the victim received "the best treatment possible".
Singh has ordered an official inquiry into the gangrape and new laws to protect women as well as stiffer penalties for the worst sex crimes.
And he said Delhi police would soon launch a drive to recruit more female officers as a confidence-building measure.
The government has also announced plans to post the photos, names and addresses of convicted rapists on official websites to publicly shame them.
The campaign will begin in Delhi, which has been dubbed India's "rape capital".
The Delhi gangrape has shone the spotlight on a crime that occurs on a daily basis in India, with most such assaults taking place in rural areas.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government has been battling criticism that it was tone-deaf to the outcry and heavy handed in its response to the protests in the Indian capital.
"It is deeply saddening and just beyond words. The police and government definitely have to do something more," said Sharanya Ramachandran, an Indian national working as an engineer in Singapore.
"They should bring in very severe punishment for such cases. They should start recognising that it is a big crime."
"Significant brain injuries"
The Singapore hospital said earlier that
the woman had suffered "significant brain injury" and was surviving
against the odds. She had already undergone three abdominal operations
before being flown to Singapore.
Protests over the lack of safety for women erupted across India after the attack, culminating last weekend in pitched battles between police and protesters in the heart of New Delhi.
New Delhi has been on edge since the weekend clashes.
Hundreds of policemen have been deployed on the streets of the capital and streets leading to the main protest site, the India Gate war memorial, have been shut for long periods, severely disrupting traffic in the city of 16 million.
Commentators and sociologists say the rape has tapped into a deep well of frustration that many Indians feel over what they see as weak governance and poor leadership on social and economic issues.
Many protesters have complained that Singh's government has done little to curb the abuse of women in the country of 1.2 billion.
A global poll by the Thomson Reuters Foundation in June found that India was the worst place to be a woman because of high rates of infanticide, child marriage and slavery.
New Delhi has the highest number of sex crimes among India's major cities, with a rape reported on average every 18 hours, according to police figures.
Government data show the number of reported rape cases in the country rose by nearly 17% between 2007 and 2011.
Protests over the lack of safety for women erupted across India after the attack, culminating last weekend in pitched battles between police and protesters in the heart of New Delhi.
New Delhi has been on edge since the weekend clashes.
Hundreds of policemen have been deployed on the streets of the capital and streets leading to the main protest site, the India Gate war memorial, have been shut for long periods, severely disrupting traffic in the city of 16 million.
Commentators and sociologists say the rape has tapped into a deep well of frustration that many Indians feel over what they see as weak governance and poor leadership on social and economic issues.
Many protesters have complained that Singh's government has done little to curb the abuse of women in the country of 1.2 billion.
A global poll by the Thomson Reuters Foundation in June found that India was the worst place to be a woman because of high rates of infanticide, child marriage and slavery.
New Delhi has the highest number of sex crimes among India's major cities, with a rape reported on average every 18 hours, according to police figures.
Government data show the number of reported rape cases in the country rose by nearly 17% between 2007 and 2011.
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