Chennai:11-year-old girl raped, Goondas Act against all 17 accused
11-year-old divyang girl raped by her apartment staff.
Chennai: The Chennai police on Thursday slapped the Goondas Act on the 17 men allegedly involved in the repeated rape of an 11-year-old girl in an apartment complex at Ayanavaram over a period of seven months. The Act enables the police to detain the accused in jail up to one year without bail. Chennai Police Commissioner A K Viswanathan has ordered that the 17 accused be charged under the Goondas Act.
All 17 accused who had gangraped a 11-year-old differently-abled girl were detained under the Goondas Act on Thursday.
Following the order of city police commissioner A.K. Viswanathan, the detention would make it difficult for the accused to be bailed out.
The police arrested 17 people, including the building’s security guard and water supplier, between the ages of 25 and 66. The residents’ association of the building cancelled the entry of the men, after being identified were produced in Mahila court. “Three men have confessed to their crime,” a senior police officer said.
The girl was allegedly sedated by giving spiked soft drinks and was also blackmailed, police said.
The offenders were booked under Sections 307 (attempt to murder), 506(ii) (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code and Section 5 (punishment for aggravated penetrative sexual assault), 10 (punishment for aggravated penetrative sexual assault) and 12 (Punishment for Sexual harassment) of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012.
The incident came to light on July 13, when the victim, a Class VII student, informed her elder sister that she was suffering from stomach pain. “She told her sister that she was raped, sometimes even gang-raped, by the men working in the apartment they lived in. Subsequently, the sister informed the parents who lodged a complaint with the police,” said a police officer.
In the complaint, the victim’s mother said the assault began when the lift operator, Ravi, took the child to an isolated place in the apartment complex and raped her. “A few days later, he brought two other men from outside, who were under the influence of alcohol and drugs, and raped her,” the complaint says. The mother alleged that the men took the girl to isolated places in the complex, including the basement and public washrooms and raped her.