Nagpur: Call it an ugly face of humanity or harsh crime reality an ill fated 16 year old girl who had escaped from the government observation home on Katol Road, was allegedly gang-raped twice, at Khamla and Jaripatka, in a span of 48 hours between April 20 and 22.
Police, on Wednesday, arrested Krishna Dongre and Jitu Manglani, both auto-rickshaw drivers, and slapped gang rape charges against them. The duo was produced before the court which remanded them to police custody till May 3.
With this, the total number of arrested in the case rose to nine. Another accused, identified as Sachin Bawne, is absconding.
Four girls fled the government home on the morning of April 20. They walked for a long time and reached Mor Bhavan Square where they hired an auto-rickshaw, driven by Dongre, and headed to Deekshabhoomi. Later, Dongre took them to Ambazari Lake where one of the minors (13) met her male friend. While she got onto his two-wheeler, the other three girls, including the survivor, travelled in the auto-rickshaw towards Pandharabodi where they had snacks.
Since the survivor wanted to return, Dongre brought her to Mor Bhavan. He informed Bawne, a Starbus driver, who called up Manglani. The trio took the survivor to Manglani’s place in the auto-rickshaw. It’s learnt that his father Ramesh was present at the place but he did not intervene.
The trio raped her at night, cops said. The next morning, Dongre and Bawne left along with survivor. Dongre paid for her breakfast and approached Feroze Ahmed, the shoe vendor at Variety Square, and told him to take the minor along but he refused.
Then Dongre roamed around with her in the city. In the night, he again met Ahmed and handed over the survivor to him at Variety Square.
Ahmed and his employee Mayur Barsagade, Atul Janbandhu, Swapnil Jawade, Pralay Mesharm and Soumil Narkhedkar then gang-raped her at an under-construction building in Sugat Nagar in Jaripatka. The accused also consume biryani and beer at the place before raping the girl.
The other two accused — Suresh Bharsakale and Sakhre babaji — kept watch after being paid Rs50. The accused dropped her back to Variety Square where she was found by a traffic cop on April 22. Sitabuldi police arrested all accused except Sakhre as he was an old man. The court has remanded them to police custody for 10 days.
The remaining three girls were found at Wathoda on Monday morning. All four girls were brought back to the government home.
