A 75-year-old grocery shop owner from Vellore district and his 45-year-old son have both been booked under the POCSO Act for sexually abusing a 13-year-old girl in their locality. The crime by the father-son duo came to light after the victim’s mother approached the Tiruppatur police station demanding action.
According to the police, Venkatachalam and his son Gundumani lived near the victim’s residence and would visit her occasionally under the guise of a casual conversation or to play with her and her sister. However, soon, the young girl began to complain about severe pain in her stomach and groin area.
“When her mother kept asking her what happened, she finally opened up and said that she was being sexually abused by the two men. The men had also threatened her against revealing the truth to anyone. The accused said that she will be murdered if she opened her mouth. The mother came with the child to the station and filed a complaint. The girl was able to clearly state what she was forced to endure,” says an investigating official.
“We have arrested them both and booked them under the POCSO Act,” he confirms.
According to reports, the child was also abused by Venkatachalam and Gundumani at their grocery shop.
“The mother had the support of the entire village when she came to the station to complain,” says the investigating officer.
This complaint comes just months after another 13-year-old in the same district was abducted and sexually assaulted by a man, an auto driver by profession, and his friends in Bengaluru. The driver had been ferrying the minor girl, who was in Class 6, to school for two years.
Talking to TNM, Tirupattur DSP Thangavelu says that the police are working on curbing child sexual abuse with a multi-pronged approach.
“On one end we are holding awareness programmes in schools and colleges twice every month to help minors understand what is good touch and what is bad touch. We tell them to immediately inform authorities or parents if they witness inappropriate behaviour,” says the DSP. “And on the other hand, we are immediately filing cases under POCSO and working towards stringent punishments for the accused in such cases. In this case, what happened is unfortunate. The parents trusted the elderly man. But we are working towards eliminating the larger problem of child sexual abuse.”