Pakistan, Sept. 3 -- India's National Human Rights Commission has stepped in after a 16-year-old girl was allegedly gang-raped on a moving private bus in Greater Noida, part of the Delhi metropolitan region. She had mistakenly got off at Pari Chowk on a rainy night, accepted a conductor's assurance that the bus would take her towards her destination and climbed aboard. Police say the vehicle was not even running a regular passenger service. The driver and conductor allegedly assaulted her before abandoning her.

The setting carries an unbearable familiarity. Nearly fourteen years have passed since the 2012 Delhi bus gang rape convulsed India, forced changes to criminal law and gave the Nirbhaya Fund its name. Yet Delhi still recorded 1,08...