Panchkula shocker: Auto driver kidnaps minor sisters, rapes elder one at knifepoint
The perpetrator of the crime has been identified as Mustaqi, 21, an autorickshaw driver, who allegedly stayed near the girls’ residence in the past but is now residing in Buddanpur in Panchkula.
Two minor sisters, walking back home from their aunt’s house, were forcibly bundled into an autorickshaw and taken to a jungle area near the petrol pump in Panchkula’s Industrial Area, Phase 1, where the elder sister, aged 12, was allegedly raped at knifepoint.
The perpetrator of the crime has been identified as Mustaqi, 21, an autorickshaw driver, who allegedly stayed near the girls’ residence in the past but is now residing in Buddanpur in Panchkula.
The incident took place on the evening of December 28 when the girls, aged 12 and five, were walking home. The autorickshaw driver, who was known to them, initially offered to drop them home but when the girls turned down the offer, he allegedly pulled them into the auto. The girls tried to run but fell in the process following which the accused allegedly gagged them, shoved them into his vehicle and drove to the secluded spot.
There he raped the 12-year-old girl in the bushes and threatened the five-year-old girl on knifepoint.
Later, he dropped the girls close to their house and fled.
Girls, differently abled father forced to run from pillar to post
Once the girls reached home, they narrated the ordeal to their father, who immediately took them to the police station. Even as there is provision of a zero FIR, which allows rape victims to file their complaints at any police station, regardless of the crime’s location, the two minor girls and their father, who has a physical disability, were forced to go from one police station to the other till about 1am before their complaint was lodged. It was only once they reached the woman police station that the station house officer, Neha Sandhu took the victim to the civil hospital in Sector 6, Panchkula, and registered an FIR.
Police, however, managed to arrest the accused within a few hours. The accused was presented in the court on Saturday and sent to judicial custody.
The case has been registered under Section 363 (kidnapping), 375 (rape) and sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act.
