PATNA: In the second incident of gang-rape of a schoolgirl in Bihar in a fortnight, a class-10 girl was allegedly gang-raped by 11 students, including one of her seniors, in West Champaran district. The main accused has been arrested and raids are on for the arrest of the rest, police said on Thursday.
The victim, a student of a government secondary school in Bagaha in West Champaran district, was assaulted when she was on her way home from school during lunch break. She was going home to get the money required for filling up forms for an examination, but the accused waylaid her, she told police.
Although the incident took place on July 10, the victim’s family approached police and lodged a formal complaint only on July 17. Since the accused youths had threatened her with dire consequences if she told anyone about the incident, she had hidden it from her parents and stopped going to school, said a police official.
According to the FIR, the 11 accused had forcibly taken her to a desolate site in an agricultural field near the road and raped her one by one. The girl could name only one accused, a student of class 11 who had passed matriculation examinations from the same school earlier this year. The cops consider him the main accused because he and the victim knew each other.
“The named accused has been arrested. He was produced him before the juvenile justice board and then sent to a remand home in Bettiah. Raids are on to arrest the other accused,” said Arvind Kumar Gupta, the superintendent of Bagaha police district. He also said a special investigation team (SIT) led by the Ramnagar SDPO has been formed to probe the incident. The victim’s medical examination report was awaited.
Earlier this month, a class-X girl student of a private school in Bihar’s Saran district had alleged that she was raped by 15 male students and three teachers on the school premises for the past seven months. Two of the accused teachers and six students have been arrested so far in that case, said police.