Indore: Cops keep woman waiting for hours to lodge rape complaint

A woman was kept waiting for more than seven hours at an Indore police station to lodge a complaint against her neighbour’s son for sexually assaulting her minor daughter.

A woman was kept waiting for more than seven hours at an Indore police station to lodge a complaint against her neighbour’s son for sexually assaulting her minor daughter.

The woman alleged that her neighbour’s 16-year-old son raped her daughter in the last week of September. "On the day after the incident, I found that her (six-year-old daughter) private part was swollen. She said that she was along with the boy. When I tried to lodge a police complaint, the boy’s family threatened me," she said.

The woman comes from an economically weak family. Her husband is a labourer while she works as a domestic help to support the family. The incident comes at a time when the police faced flak for the rape of a five-year-old girl inside a school van in the same police station area.

On Sunday, the woman mustered courage to approach the Aerodrome police station to file a complaint. After reaching the police station at 9.30am, the woman was kept waiting till 4pm. It was only after the media posed queries about the incident and the subsequent delay in lodging the complaint that a case was lodged.

"I kept on urging the policemen to register a case but they told me to for the thana in-charge, Kanahaiya Lal Dangi, to arrive. When he did not turn up, I returned home," the victim's mother claimed.

After the media’s intervention, Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Aditya Pratap Singh directed Dangi to contact the woman. Later, a case was lodged at 5 pm after the ASP called the family promising to take action.

Shockingly, Dangi refused to respond to media query on his delay in arriving at the police station. Senior police officers were taken aback by Dangi’s response. "This is carelessness and I will direct the SP to seek answers from TI. This is lack of sensitivity," Deputy Inspector General (DIG) Rakesh Gupta said.