LUCKNOW: An Indian court on Monday granted bail to two of five men detained earlier this year on suspicion of raping and murdering two teenage girls in a case that sparked global outrage.

The low-caste cousins, aged 12 and 14, were found hanging from a tree in an impoverished village in northern Uttar Pradesh state in May.

Presiding judge Anil Kumar granted relief to the two accused police officers after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) said it could not file charges against the men, citing a lack of evidence, according to the Press Trust of India.

The men were released after spending 90 days in detention, the maximum time that a person can be held without being charged in India, on a bond of Rs200,000 and on the condition that they do not tamper with evidence or threaten witnesses.

The girls were reported at the time to have been gang-raped and murdered after going into the fields to relieve themselves because their homes, like most in their village in Badaun district, lacked lavatories.

Published in Dawn, September 2nd , 2014