E-Paper
Minor gang rape case: Hyderabad police get three-day custody of prime accused
In another development, five juvenile accused in the minor gang rape case have filed separate petitions before the juvenile court seeking bail.
A metropolitan magistrate court at Nampally criminal court complex in Hyderabad on Wednesday granted three-day police custody of the prime suspect in connection with a minor girl’s gang rape on May 28.
In another development, five juvenile accused in the case have filed separate petitions before the juvenile court seeking bail. The police also filed separate petitions in the same court seeking the custody of the five accused on Wednesday. The matter is expected to come up for hearing on Thursday.
Prime accused Saduddin Malik (18), who was arrested by the Jubilee Hills police on June 3, was sent on a judicial remand on June 4. He was lodged in the Chanchalguda jail. The five other accused – all juveniles – who were arrested between June 4 and 7, were sent to the custody of the juvenile court.
Acting on a petition filed by the police on Tuesday stating that they needed Malik’s custody for seven days to elicit more details about the incident, the court granted the accused’s custody to police for three days.
Malik was the one who had forced the girl to get into his Mercedes Benz car at Amnesia and Insomnia Pub on May 28 evening and drove it up to the pastry shop, where she was shifted into a Toyota Innova in which he and five others raped her, said police.
Malik would be taken into the police custody at 10 am on Thursday and after questioning, he will be sent back to Chanchalguda jail on Sunday after being produced before the court, a police official said.
Meanwhile, Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee president A Revanth Reddy questioned as to why the police had not served notices on the owner of Toyota Innova car. “Hyderabad police commissioner C V Anand has admitted that the vehicle had Telangana government sticker and the juvenile accused who had used it had removed the sticker and wiped out all the evidence. When the commissioner said the car was driven by a minor, why hasn’t he questioned the car owner?” Reddy asked.
He demanded that the police register a case under the Motor Vehicles Act against the car owner for giving the vehicle to a minor. “It is unfortunate that a government vehicle was used for anti-social activities,” he said.
However, home minister Mohammed Mahmood Ali told the reporters that the Telangana police had arrested all the accused in the case and had not spared anybody, irrespective of their political connection.
“They (police) are probing the case without any partiality; and there is absolutely no pressure from the government on the police. We will do justice to the rape victim and her family,” Ali said, adding that the government won’t allow the opposition parties to take political mileage out of it.
