CHENNAI: Aminjikarai police on Sunday arrested six persons, including four women, in connection with the death of a 15-year-old girl at an apartment in the city.
A day after the girl’s death came to light, police registered a case of murder against the six and have also invoked sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Pocso) Act and the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
While police had initially ruled out sexual assault in the case, sources said that Sections 5 and 6 of the Pocso Act, pertaining to aggravated penetrative sexual assault, had been invoked as an object might have been used to violate the child as a “form of punishment”. The girl’s body was found with burn injuries, police had said on Saturday.
“During an inquiry, one of the arrested women confessed to violating the girl. That was the reason for invoking the Pocso Act,” a senior police officer told TNIE. Police are still awaiting autopsy results.
The suspects arrested are Nivetha alias Nasiya (30), her husband Mohammad Nishath (36), the couple’s friends Lokesh (26) and his wife Jayasakthi (24), their domestic worker Maheshwari (40), and Nishath’s sister Seema Begum (39). Following police inquiry, all six suspects were sent for judicial remand.
The police said the victim, who hailed from Thanjavur, had been working at the couple’s rented house in an apartment complex in Aminjikarai since December 2023 to take care of their six-year-old child.
Based on the house owner’s complaint on Friday, the police registered a case of unnatural death which was altered after the inquiry.
‘Suspects assaulted minor multiple times’
Police said during inquiry, it was revealed that all six suspects had physically assaulted the girl at different instances over last three months. During one such assault on Thursday, the girl collapsed and died in the bathroom of the flat, after which the couple fled to their relative’s house, police said. Sources said Nishat’s sister from Thanjavur had referred the girl, who was later sent to the city to make a living.