Sex determination rampant in J&K despite crackdown

Patna, Jul 17: A 15-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a security guard at the Covid-19 quarantine center of the Patna Medical College Hospital where she was admitted after being rescued from a railway station, police said on Thursday.

The accused, Mahesh (40), was arrested on Wednesday night after being booked under the POCSO Act and other relevant IPC sections by the Pir Bahore police station, according to Arti Jaiswal, the in-charge of the women's police station here.

“The accused is being sent to jail while the victim will be undergoing medical tests on Thursday, as is the norm for all sexual assault survivors," Jaiswal said.

The girl had run away from her home in Nalanda district more than a week ago and reached Barh railway station on the outskirts of Patna to catch a train for Kolkata where her father is a daily wage-earner, police said.

She was spotted by Government Railway Police (GRP) personnel who informed the child helpline. The child helpline personnel, taking note of the girl’s tender age and her disturbed frame of mind, convinced her not to undertake the journey and brought her to the hospital’s quarantine ward for COVID-19 suspects as a precautionary measure, they said.

On the night of July 8, a few hours after the girl's arrival at the hospital, she was caught hold of by the accused inside the bathroom and allegedly raped. The accused also threatened her with dire consequences if she spilt the beans and, as per the FIR, kept harassing her sexually.

She finally decided to speak up when another girl, carrying a mobile phone, was similarly brought to the hospital by child helpline a couple of days ago. Using the fellow inmate’s phone, she narrated her ordeal to the helpline personnel who informed the police.

“Her Covid-19 test report is negative. After her examination, for the sexual assault, by a six-member medical board is over, she will be sent to a shelter home by the child helpline," Jaiswal said.

Meanwhile, state women’s commission chairperson Dilmani Mishra strongly reacted to the incident and said, “We are waiting for the medical reports of the girl. We will ensure that justice is done in the matter.”

New Delhi, Jan 18: Two men accused of kidnapping and brutally raping a five-year-old girl in Delhi in 2013 have been held guilty by a court in the national capital today. The POCSO court, which will announce the quantum of punishment on January 30, said, "In our society the minor girls are worshipped as goddess on certain occasions but in the present case the victim child had experienced exceptional depravity and extreme brutality."

"The crime against the victim was committed in a most grotesque and revolting manner and the collective conscience of the community was shaken," the court added while holding the accused - Manoj Shah and Pradeep Kumar - guilty.

The assault which took place just four months after Nirbhaya's brutal rape had grabbed headlines with its shocking details. The girl, who was named Gudiya by sections of the media, went missing and the police told her parents to look for her themselves. She was found two days later, tied in the basement of the east Delhi house she lived in with traces of candles and bottles inside her private parts.

The convicts had fled after raping Gudiya and shoving a candle and bottle inside her private parts, leaving her at Manoj Shah's room, after believing the five-year-old to be dead. The child was rescued 40 hours later on April 17, 2013.

Manoj Shah and Pradeep Kumar were arrested by Delhi police separately from Muzaffarpur and Darbhanga in Bihar respectively in 2013. The charge sheet was filed on May 24 that year and charges were framed by the court on July 11. But, it took more than five years to complete the recording of the statement of 57 prosecution witnesses in the POCSO court.

"Though the trial should have been completed in two years, we are happy we got justice," said the father of the girl.

One of the convicts, Manoj Shah, allegedly assaulted some reporters while being taken out of the courtroom.

Chandigarh, Jan 15: A man, who has killed two women over infidelity over the last 10 years was arrested from a news channel studio in Chandigarh when he confessed to these crimes during a live programme, police said.

In the television programme on News18, the 31-year-old accused, Maninder Singh, who is a cab driver, confessed killing his live-in partner, a 27-year-old nurse Sarabjit Kaur at a Chandigarh hotel on New Year's Eve.

Singh, a former murder convict and currently out on bail, also confessed about his crime committed in Karnal in 2010.

"I killed her (Sarabjit Kaur) because she was having an affair with her sister-in-law's brother," Maninder told the news channel.

Confessing his previous crime, Maninder said he had killed Renu in Karnal. "She was also having an affair with a man from Uttar Pradesh," he said.

Singh was arrested while the programme was still on air as police rushed into the studio.

Haryana Police had arrested him for killing the woman in 2010. He was convicted by a trial court, but he later got bail from the Punjab and Haryana High Court.