Kalpetta: Six youngsters who had been sexually abusing seven girl students of an orphanage in the district since December last year were arrested on Tuesday.
The incident came to light when a security staff member of the orphanage found a girl on the premises of a shop near the orphanage at odd hours on Saturday. The orphanage administrator filed a complaint with the Kalpetta police on Monday after counselling the students.
The girls were raped and physically tortured by the accused, all from the same area. The orphange school is located about 500 meters from the hostel. The key accused runs a hotel-cum-grocery shop in front of the main gate of the school. He and and his accomplices used to lure the girls to the shop with sweets and rape them in a shed behind the shop after showing them porn films on a mobile phone.
Wayanad SP Rajpal Meena said that all the accused were taken into custody from various places. Sections under POCSO Act and section 164 IPC (recording the statement or confessions during investigation) were slapped on the accused.
The statements of the girls were registered in front of the magistrate at Sulthan Bathery. The Kalpetta police produced them before the district sessions court in the evening and they were remanded in judicial custody.
