CHENNAI: As he wrapped a cloth around her mouth and gagged her, the two-and-half year-old girl was rather excited. The man, a 24-year-old guest of a neighbour, had promised her to view a popular cartoon episode on TV, if she remained quiet.
But what he did in the next few minutes was so unbearable that it was impossible to remain quiet. She started bleeding between her legs and started crying as hard she could with her mouth gagged.
“The second time while climbing down from the terrace, I heard her screams. When I went near the door, he opened it and I saw my child standing next to him,” said the girl’s mother at the government hospital where the child is recovering.
The mother had been criss-crossing the cramped small building housing five portions in which lower income families were staying on rent on the city outskirts. She was desperately searching for her missing daughter who was standing just next to her while collecting water from a pipe near the entrance of the compound at around 1.30 pm on Monday.
Her husband, a construction labourer, was away for work and the mother has to take care of the couple’s three children.
“She was crying and I assumed she must have fallen down. But soon I noticed the blood and nail marks on her private parts and chest,” she told Express even as the family is yet to come in terms to the event.
As she barged into the house and other residents started assembling, the man, Vijay, managed to flee and the police are on the look out for him.
The family took the child to a nearby private hospital and then was referred to a government hospital. The child took more than an hour to allow even her mother to touch her and see the injuries. Only on Tuesday morning, the child opened up to her mother and narrated what Vijay had done to her.
Vijay, a resident of Triplicane, used to occasionally visit his grandmother, who was making a living by selling water packets in the beaches. “I heard the sound when he locked the door, but never thought he would have taken my child to do something like this,” the mother said.
Even on Tuesday, the child was allowing none other than her mother to come close or touch her.
A police officer in the jurisdiction said three special teams have been formed to trace Vijay and a case has been registered under sections 3 (Penetrative sexual assault) and 4 of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012.