A woman was sexually assaulted by an ambulance driver and his helper in Lucknow’s Gazipur area while transporting her terminally ill neurology husband to UP’s Siddharthnagar. The accused also allegedly disconnected the husband’s oxygen support and threw him out of the vehicle eventually leading to his death.
The woman admitted her husband to a private hospital on Aravali Marg after he was sick for a few days. Unable to pay the private hospital’s fees, the woman hired an ambulance from Gazipur (Indiranagar) Police Station to get him back home. The woman was accompanied by her brother.
According to the woman, she was forced to sit in the front with the driver and his aide. She said that after some time the duo started touching her inappropriately. When she shouted her husband sensed the trouble and he along with her brother started shouting. However, the driver and his accomplice continued to molest her while she kept fighting with them.
“They later stopped the ambulance on the main road of the Chhawani police station in Basti, forcibly removed the oxygen mask of my husband and threw him out. They locked my brother in the front cabin,” she said. The duo also reportedly looted Rs 10,000 from her purse and anklets, mangalsutra, Aadhaar card and hospital reports.
Subsequently, her brother managed to dial 112 (police helpline) and 108 (ambulance). “The police recorded our statement and said we should get the patient admitted and then come to the Chhawani police station to get the FIR lodged,” she said. The woman said the 108 (ambulance service) got her husband admitted to Basti district hospital.
“Due to his serious condition, he was referred to the Medical College in Gorakhpur. But by the time we could reach Gorakhpur, he had succumbed,” alleged the victim.
ADCP Jitendra Dubey said the woman had lodged a complaint and a case had been registered. The police are yet to arrest the erring driver.
As per the sources, the supine attitude of police authorities came to the fore when the victim woman approached the police authorities in Chhavni police station in Basti on September 1. They turned her back asking her to go to Lucknow to get the case registered. However, after the case hit the headlines, the senior officers started monitoring it at their level.
Meanwhile, taking the note of the incident, the opposition including Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav and senior Congress leader and Rajya Sabha member Pramod Tiwari launched a broadside on the Uttar Pradesh government. While the SP chief wondered if any dispensation existed in the state as such incidents were happening, Pramod Tiwari also raised doubts over the law and order scenario of UP.
"I want to bring about the point that the UP government has failed in securing the women and the incident of Hathras, Ghaziabad, and Farrukhbad are just a few examples,” said Tiwari.