A 32-year-old pavement dweller died on Saturday, almost 36 hours after being brutally sexually assaulted with a sharp object inside a parked tempo at Saki Naka early on Friday that left her with serious lacerations to her private parts. The 45-year old accused, a part-time driver who is also a pavement dweller, was tracked to Kurla late on Friday with the help of CCTV cameras and arrested.
“The woman had suffered severe injuries in her perineal area (the area between the thighs) and some of her organs, including intestines, were spilling out when she was brought to the hospital,” said a senior doctor. The woman, assaulted outside Rashid Compound, was on ventilator at Rajawadi Hospital for roughly 28 hours before her death around 11.30am on Saturday.On learning of the crime, CM Uddhav Thackeray called an urgent meeting of senior IPS officers and said the case will be tried in a fast-track court. He directed the police to file a chargesheet in a month. “Police have been asked to be more vigilant and take steps to ensure that Mumbai’s image as a safe city is not tarnished,” said a senior police official.
Around 3.15am on Friday, a security guard at Rashid Compound near Chandivli Studio had called the police control saying a woman was being assaulted inside a parked tempo; all tempos parked outside belong to Rashid Compound. A Saki Naka police team reached the location within 10 minutes and found the injured woman. The accused, who is from UP, had fled by then. “Wasting no time, a police constable and other cops got the tempo’s ignition key from the security guard and drove the victim to the hospital,” said DCP (Zone X) Maheshwar Reddy.
“The motive behind the crime is not yet known and the accused has not revealed the reason. The CCTV footage showed him fleeing but we did not see him carrying any weapon used in the crime. The victim has suffered severe injuries and lost her life due to excess bleeding,” said a police officer.
Till late on Saturday, it was still unclear if the police had recovered the sharp object used in the assault. She was brought to the hospital in a serious condition and a five-member team of gynaecologists and surgeons operated on her on Friday. She never regained consciousness, though, to be able to talk to the doctors or the police.
Dr Vidya Thakur, medical superintendent, Rajawadi Hospital, said the woman was brought in, in a critical condition. “We don’t know how the injuries were caused or if she was sexually assaulted. Forensic tests and police investigation should reveal that,” she said.
Mumbai police commissioner Hemant Nagrale said a special investigation team (SIT) has been formed which will be led by ACP Jyotsana Rasam. The accused has been remanded to police custody till September 21. “The investigation will be completed in a month. Initially, it was suspected more persons may have been involved but the arrest of the accused has cleared that,” said Nagrale.
“There are QR codes placed in the jurisdiction of all police stations and whenever police personnel are deployed on night patrol, they have to scan the code to show they have completed patrolling the locality. As part of the investigation, we will check whether police patrolling was conducted in that locality. But the incident occurred in little time and we have to verify whether the team had patrolled the area before it happened,” he said.
“The accused has been booked under Indian Penal Code sections for murder, rape, unnatural offence and sexual harassment,” said a Saki Naka police officer. On Saturday, he was produced before the Andheri court and remanded in police custody till September 21.
Police said the victim, married and separated twice, did odd jobs for a living. She had two daughters from her first marriage and a son from the second. She did not have a good equation with her family.
She, though, briefly met her mother and neighbours known to her since childhood on Thursday around 7pm, hours before her death. A relative told TOI: “She had no bad habits. She was upset ever since her (second) husband left. Her daughters live with her physically diabled mother and son with estranged husband. The person who killed her was never seen by any of us. Her mother is in shock. Her younger sister visited the hospital and completed the formalities.”
(The victim’s identity has not been revealed to protect her privacy as per Supreme Court directives on cases related to sexual assault)
Surjitt Sahani
