Madhya Pradesh: 16-year-old gangraped by six, homes of three accused demolished

Six men gangraped a 16-year-old girl and beat her up in Madhya Pradesh’s Rewa district, the police said on Sunday, reported PTI.

The assault took place when the girl had gone to a temple on Saturday afternoon with a male friend. Additional Superintendent of Police Anil Sonkar said that four men and two minor boys accosted them and took the girl to a place near a water body, where she was raped. “After raping the girl, they thrashed her and took away her mobile phone and anklet,” Sonkar added.

The accused persons threatened to kill the girl and her friend if they spoke about the assault, according to the police. Sonkar said the girl was taken to hospital as her health deteriorated.

The police have arrested three of the accused and a search is underway to find the others. A first information report was registered under Sections 376 (d) (gangrape), 395 (dacoity), and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act.

Homes of accused demolished

The Rewa district administration, meanwhile, demolished the homes of those arrested. “The same treatment would be meted out to the three others who were involved in the crime,” an unidentified official told PTI.

The authorities claimed that the buildings were illegally constructed.

While there are no provisions under Indian law to demolish the home of anyone accused of a crime, this pattern has been regularly observed across Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled states.

On September 8, a three-and-a-half-year-old nursery student of a private school in Madhya Pradesh’s capital Bhopal was allegedly raped.

The authorities on September 13 demolished the home of a school bus driver, who has been arrested in the case along with a woman attendant.