E-Paper
21-year-old woman gang-raped, her male friend assaulted at Bopdev Ghat
The police have released sketches of two of the suspects as they intensified efforts to trace the culprits
A 21-year-old woman was allegedly raped by three unidentified persons, who also tied her male friend to a tree and assaulted him, at an isolated place at Bopdev Ghat at around 12-12.30 am on Friday, police said.
The police have released sketches of two of the suspects as they intensified efforts to trace the culprits.
According to the police, the survivor is an event management student, and her 22-year-old male friend is studying chartered accountancy.
The crime was reported near a police help centre which was closed at the time of incident.
Two days ago, a 20-year-old girl was allegedly abducted and molested when she went with her friend to Bopdev Ghat. Police have arrested a suspect.
The help centre at Bopdev Ghat under Kondhwa police station jurisdiction was set up in 2021 to facilitate better patrolling in the area after 10 incidents of robbery, attack on tourists were reported in the year.
According to the police, the survivor who hails from Gujarat and her friend from Jalgaon district, visited the ghat on bike and walked inside the forest area after parking the vehicle along the roadside. After spending an hour at the place and clicking photographs of night light views of the city from the hill, the three accused approached them when the duo was returning to the main road. The trio overpowered the survivor’s friend by threatening with knife, wooden sticks and koyta. They tied him to a tree using cloth and belt, dragged the girl to a deserted place and fled after gang-raping her.
Later, the survivor released her friend, and the duo returned to the main road.
According to the police, the duo could not contact anyone because of poor mobile connectivity in the area.
The male friend later informed his parents and the duo rushed to the Dinanath Mangeshkar Hospital located in Kothrud.
The hospital, however, referred them to the Sassoon General Hospital.
The public relations officer (PRO) of Dinanath Mangeshkar Hospital was unavailable for comment despite repeated attempts to contact him on phone.
Sassoon hospital alerted the police about the incident at around 5 am on Friday and a first information report (FIR) was filed.
Ranjan Kumar Sharma, joint commissioner of police, said, “We have formed more than 12 teams of Crime Branch, Detection Branch, Dog Squad to nab the accused. As the area has no closed-circuit television (CCTV) camera facility, we are checking footages of nearby localities.”
According to the police, the survivor is stable and the process to record her statement has been initiated. In the evening, police released two sketches of suspected individuals and asked people to alert on 020-26122880.
On the closed police help centre at the ghat at the time of the incident, Kumar said, “The centre is not operating 24x7 and is used for patrolling. Cops combed the area on the day of the accident and always advise visitors to leave the place after sunset.”
Police officials said QR code boards of My Safe Pune mobile application have been placed at seven locations in the area for cops to scan it and confirm their presence in the area as part of patrolling routine.
The Kondhwa Police Station has filed a case under Sections 70(1), 126(2), 115(2), 309(6), 352, 351 (2), (3), of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and Sections 4, 25 of the Arms Act and Sections 37(1), 135 of the Maharashtra Police act against three unidentified individuals
Meanwhile, chief minister Eknath Shinde convened a meeting on women safety at Mantralaya on Friday. Chairing the meet attended by home minister Devendra Fadnavis, director general of police Rashmi Shukla and Mumbai police commissioner Vivek Phansalkar, the CM said that there must be a good response mechanism by the police. He directed all police commissioners, district superintendents of police and district collectors to take such women-related issues in fast-track courts.
