A 24-year-old man, accused of raping a minor girl, tried to end his life on Tuesday by slitting his wrists inside the Bengaluru City Civil Court complex.
On Tuesday morning, 24-year-old Vinod Kumar was brought to court by the Hennur Police for an evidentiary hearing in a rape case of a minor, which was registered in December last year.
When he was in the court hall, he slit his wrists with a sharp object. The police immediately administered first aid and rushed him to Victoria Hospital. He was given treatment and is currently out of danger.
“He says he does not want to go to jail and that fear drove him to take the drastic step. He told us that his lawyer and the victim’s lawyer had spoken about a settlement but the survivor’s family refused,” the police said. The police are not sure yet where he obtained the sharp object from.
On December 2, 2017, 36-year-old Debo*, gardener at a posh apartment in Bengaluru’s Thanisandra had filed a missing person complaint with the Hennur Police. Debo had complained that his 13-year-old daughter, Diya* had gone missing that day.
“When the man and his wife came home that evening, their daughter was missing. She would generally come home from school in the afternoon and be at home. They suspected that their neighbour, Vinod, could have abducted her since he would play with her when no one was around. When we tracked Vinod down, we found that he had raped the girl and he was then arrested,” the police said.
Police say that upon investigation, it was revealed that Vinod was allegedly grooming the little girl for a long time and had convinced her to go with him. “He had told her that he loves her. The girl was in a bad shape,” the police added.
An FIR was registered with the Hennur Police under Sections 366 (abduction), 376 (rape) of the IPC and Sections 4 (penetrative sexual assault), 5 (penetrative sexual assault causing physical incapabilities in the child or causes the child to become mentally ill) and 8 (sexual assault on a minor) of the POCSO Act.
This is not the first time such an incident has occurred. In March this year, a 29-year-old man accused in a POCSO case ended his life in Bengaluru. This incident, too, occurred in a case which was registered under the Hennur Police Station. A POCSO case was filed at the station against Muraliraj, a daily wage worker, in 2016.
During an evidentiary hearing on March 2, Muraliraj and the victim’s relatives had discussed the possibility of a compromise. The girl’s relative Manjunath had allegedly demanded Rs 10 lakh in order to withdraw the case. Muraliraj ended his life after the incident, the Hennur Police added.