Bokaro, Jharkhand:
On Tuesday evening, a 10-year-old girl was dragged from her home, as the entire village watched, to a nearby forest, where she was raped by a 25-year-old man.
The child was raped on the orders of a self-appointed headman of a remote village in Jharkhand's Bokaro district. He decreed that she be raped as revenge for her older brother's alleged attempt at molesting her assaulter's sister.
The man had complained to the headman, alleging that on Monday night, the girl's brother tried to molest his sister.
A medical test has confirmed that the minor was raped. Her father, a farmer, was out for work when she was dragged out of her home. Her mother, who was in the house, mutely accepts that her daughter was raped on orders of the headman, who appropriates that title by virtue of being the chief of a dominant caste in the village
The headman has been arrested, as has the rape survivor's brother and the man who assaulted her. Jharkhand Police spokesperson Anurag Gupta told NDTV, "FIRs have been filed from both sides. We have arrested three people. I have instructed the state police to file a chargesheet in the case as soon as possible."
Not many villagers are willing to speak on camera, but they say that almost the entire village was witness to the ghastly crime. Locals say they did not intervene because of the clout of the headman. The police admitted that headman is a very feared man whose word is law in the area.