Indian police officer accused of raping girl who reported gang rape

Vanguard One · May 5, 2022

Indians hold placards protesting against the alleged gang rape and killing of a Dalit woman in Uttar Pradesh state, in Gauhati, India, Saturday, Oct. 10, 2020.

A 13-year-old girl in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh who went to police to report she was gang raped was then allegedly raped again by an officer at the station.

The accused official has been arrested and all police officers posted at the police station where the alleged incident took place have been removed from duty, New Delhi TV channel NDTV reports.

The girl alleged that she had been gang raped by four men last month.

A university student shouts slogan during a protest rally against recent gang rape of a girl in New Delhi, in Kolkata, India, Saturday, Jan. 29, 2022. (AP)

The girl's father said in his police complaint that four men took his daughter to the neighbouring state of Madhya Pradesh.

The men allegedly sexually assaulted her for four days before bringing her back to her village in the Lalitpur district and fleeing.

The girl went with her aunt to the police station the next day, and was allegedly raped again by a police officer, NDTV reported.

Lalitpur district police chief Nikhil Pathak the girl told him what happened after being brought to his office by a local charity.

"When I was informed, I made sure a case was filed," he was quoted by the BBC as telling reporters.

The case has prompted outrage on social media.

"If police stations are not safe for women, then where will they go to take complaints?" Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said in a tweet.

"The gang-rape of a 13-year-old girl in Lalitpur and then her rape by the police in-charge when she went to file a complaint shows how genuine law and order reforms are being suppressed in the noise of 'bulldozers'."

Brutal violence against women has been in the spotlight in the country over recent years.

In 2012, the gang rape of a young woman on a New Delhi bus shocked the nation. The woman later died of her injuries.

The case prompted tougher punishment of sex crimes, including death for repeat rapists, to be introduced a year later.

Four of the men found guilty of the woman's gang rape were executed in March 2020.

However, more appalling cases have continued to prompt protests, including the alleged rape and killing of a nine-year-old girl near a crematorium in southwest New Delhi last year.