5 teens, a man held for gangrape of minor in Kalachowki

Five teens and a 27-year-old man were arrested in Mumbai for allegedly raping a 15-year-old girl and blackmailing her with a recorded video.

MUMBAI: The police arrested five teenagers and a 27-year-old man on Sunday for allegedly raping a 15-year-old girl in their area in Kalachowki. Four of the teens were 17 years old, and one was 16.

Four of the teens were 17 years old, and one was 16. The adult man is arrested and currently in police custody. (Shutterstock)

The police said the teenagers are college students and knew the victim to be residing in the same area as them. Some of them took the girl to the 27-year-old accused’s house and allegedly sexually assaulted her in October 2024. “They even recorded the sexual assault and used the video to blackmail the minor girl,” said a police officer. They allegedly threatened her that they would make the video viral online and repeatedly demanded she send them obscene pictures of herself and raped her on multiple occasions till January 2025, he added.

One of the accused told his 15-year-old female friend about the incident, the officer said. “His friend reached out to the victim’s house to talk about it. After this, the family came to know about the rape and approached the Kalachowki police.

The Kalachowki police in Central Mumbai registered a case against the six accused under Sections 65 (rape on a woman), 70 (gangrape) and 351 (criminal intimidation) of the Bhartiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, and 12 (sexual harassment of a child), 4 (penetrative sexual assault) and 8 (sexual assault) of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012.

The minors were sent to the Children’s Correction Home in Dongri. The major accused is in police custody.