Sex abuse horror rattles city suburbs- Facebook buddies lure, rape Salt Lake girl, held

HT, 19 Dec 2016, Kolkata: In an incident that again turned the spotlight on rising incidents of crime against women in Bengal, the police arrested two youths, aged between 18 and 20, for raping a 16-year-old girl they befriended on Facebook.

Virat Thakur and Subham Pandey, pursuing a hotel management course at a private institute, were nabbed from a government housing complex at Jagaddal in North 24-Parganas district. Police said Virat befriended the girl, a student of Class 10 at a government school in Salt Lake, in October. The two connected on Facebook and Virat urged her for a meeting many times only to be rebuffed. But she finally relented and agreed to meet him at a cafeteria in Salt Lake. They struck up a conversation and Virat asked her to spend the afternoon with him.

“According to the complaint, the girl accepted the proposal and the two hailed an auto-rickshaw for Bidhannagar railway station. Then they left for the government housing at Jagaddal where Virat’s friend Subham stays. There wasn’t anyone around at Subham’s flat at the time and the two took turns to rape her,” a police officer said.

The girl narrated her ordeal after reaching home and the family lodged a complaint with Bidhannagar (North) police. The accused were produced in a court on Sunday and sent to police custody for four days.