Dalit woman rape: Accused held

Over a month after a woman was dragged, abducted and raped in Muktsar district of Punjab, the police on Saturday arrested one person in connection with the case. The incident of the victim being dragged by one of her abductors was caught on a CCTV camera. The CCTV footage shows a young man forcibly dragging the 24-year-old woman out of her office in broad daylight on March 25. Meanwhile, the man, who abducted and raped the was arrested Saturday. The accused has been remanded to police custody for three days.

The accused Gurjinder Singh, who was caught abducting the woman on a CCTV camera installed in a nearby shop in Malout in Muktsar, surrendered a day after the victim and her father met officials of the National Commission for Scheduled Castes to seek justice.

The NCSC had summoned some of the top police officers and demanded an explanation over the delay in arresting the accused, who reportedly belongs to the same village as the woman.

The incident took place on March 25 when the young man forcibly dragged the woman out of her office in broad daylight.

The woman claimed that the accused took her to Tapa Khera village where he raped her in a farmhouse.

A case has been registered against the accused under various provisions of the law, including abduction and rape.

Meanwhile, the car in which the accused had abducted the victim is yet to be recovered. In the video, the woman can be seen screaming, shouting for help and struggling to break free from the grip of her abductor.

Tragically, no one came forward to help the woman, who was later taken to a farmhouse and raped repeatedly. Five days after the incident, the woman got an FIR registered in the case. The video, recorded by a CCTV camera placed in a nearby shop, also shows the victim’s colleagues running out later and shouting.