Senior citizen held for raping 8-year-old girl

The Sahar police has arrested a 62-year-old man for unnatural sex with an eight-year-old girl.

The incident came to light on February 24 and the next day the family approached the police station, after which the accused was arrested at a local factory in Sahar area where he was working as a watchman.

The police booked the accused under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO). Later, on Friday, he was produced in court and remanded to police custody till March 2.

According to sources, the accused has two sons, aged 25 and 28 . His wife had died some 20 years ago.

The girl is a class two student, and the only child of her parents. Her father works at an automobile shop and her mother works in a housekeeping company. The accused and the girl are neighbours and they used to visit each other often. In fact, locals used to believe that the senior citizen used to love her as a daughter or granddaughter.

On February, 24 at about 11.30 am, the girl’s aunt, who lives near by, saw her washing her hands repeatedly. The girl had an expensive chocolate with her. Amused, the woman asked the girl about the chocolate and the reason why she was washing her hands repeatedly. To which the scared girl burst into tears and informed her aunt that the accused had unnatural sex with her. Later in the evening, the girl’s aunt informed her parents about this revelation and later they went to the police.

When The Asian Age visited the chawl where the victim and the accused reside, locals informed this newspaper that the she used to address the accused as baba. The accused often used to call the girl to his house to fold his clothes, and he used to give her a big chocolate every time.

But after Wednesday’s incident it came to be known that the accused had been abusing the girl for the past one year on the pretext of giving her chocolates and making her folding clothes. The accused had suffered a minor heart attack twice and the locality was shocked to learn of his alleged crimes.

Commenting on the incident, a senior official said, “The girl was sent for a medical check up and her reports are yet to come. But as per her statement, the accused was having unnatural sex with her for a year. Further investigation in the case is on.”