Taxi driver held for sexually assaulting, strangling 3-year-old child in Burari

A 32-year-old private taxi driver was arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting and murdering the three-year-old son of a female friend in north Delhi’s Burari on Thursday night, police said on Tuesday.

A 32-year-old private taxi driver was arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting and murdering the three-year-old son of a female friend in north Delhi’s Burari on Thursday night, police said on Tuesday.

The driver was arrested on Saturday, two days after the crime came to light, and has been sent to jail, they said. (File photo for representation)

The driver was arrested on Saturday, two days after the crime came to light, and has been sent to jail, they said.

The police said the woman is a beautician and lives with her husband at their home in outer Delhi’s Mangolpuri. Apart from Delhi-NCR cities, the woman visits other states for professional purposes. She knew the taxi driver for the past six-seven months, as she often hired his cab for outstation visits.

On October 20, the woman left the home with her three children after an altercation with her husband. She asked the taxi driver to pick them up in his cab and went to her parental home in Uttar Pradesh’s Bulandshahr, said a senior police officer, who did not want to be named.

According to the officer, on October 28, the woman and her children reached Jaipur in his taxi from Bulandshahr for some work. They all returned to Delhi on October 29.

The woman chose to stay at the taxi driver’s home with her children because of the argument she had with her husband, the officer said.

In the evening, the woman’s three-year-old son was constantly crying when the driver took the child out for a drive in order to comfort him, her permission, police said.

“Around 10 pm, he returned with the unconscious child. There were bruises on the body. When the woman asked him, he tried to mislead her, saying it could be because of reaction to some medicine she had been administering to her son,” the officer said, quoting the woman’s statement.

The woman rushed her child to a nearby government in his taxi. After examining the child, the doctors declared him brought dead and told her about the possibility of a sexual assault. The hospital authorities informed the police.

“When the woman confronted the taxi driver, he fled. A case of murder and sodomy was registered at the Burari police station. He was caught on Saturday,” the officer added.

The police officer said the man confessed and said he sexually assaulted the child in the taxi at an isolated place and strangled him to death to avoid getting identified.