Indian police officers 'kidnap and rape teenage girl at police station'

Authorities are hunting the suspects in the state of Uttar Pradesh

Lizzie Dearden
Friday 02 January 2015 20:46 GMT
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A gang-rape last December sparked protests demanding better protection for women
A gang-rape last December sparked protests demanding better protection for women

Two Indian police officers have gone on the run after allegedly kidnapping and raping a 14-year-old girl at a police station.

Authorities in the state of Uttar Pradesh have been searching for the constables since the attack on New Year’s Eve.

The victim had left her home to go to the toilet in a nearby field when she was bundled into a police car and taken to a Musajhag police station, in Badaun district, the Hindustan Times reported.

“They locked my daughter in a room located in the police station. Later, they raped her and when her condition deteriorated they dumped her on the outskirts of the village at midnight,” her mother said.

When she and her daughter returned to the station the next day to report the crime, the staff present would not record it, they claimed.

The complaint was only officially investigated after extensive Indian media coverage, the Hindustan Times reported, and the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Yadav, has now vowed to take swift action.

Many girls and women in rural India have no access to toilets and use local fields

Policing in Badaun district was criticised last year, when two teenage girls were found hanging in a mango tree after allegedly being gang raped and murdered.

An official probe later found that the cousins committed suicide and had not been attacked, alleging that their family members had fabricated evidence to frame five men who were arrested.

The two girls had also disappeared after leaving to go to the toilet in a field because they had no access to proper sanitation – a practice campaigners say put women at risk of sexual attacks, bacterial infections and snake bites.

A series of high-profile rape cases in India have sparked international in recent years, leading to tougher punishments for sexual offences.

On Friday, police arrested three men for allegedly gang raping a Japanese research scholar and keeping her captive in a Buddhist pilgrimage centre.

The 22-year-old woman was reportedly held hostage for almost three weeks in Bodh Gaya, a town nearly 80 miles south of Patna, the capital of Bihar state.

She managed to escape on 26 December from a man posing as a tourist guide who had taken her to the retreat and four other suspects.

Additional reporting by PA

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