A 25-year-old construction worker in Telangana raped a tribal woman, hit her in the face with a log and raped her again as she lay unconscious, police said. The incident occurred on the night of May 9, at Choutuppal in Yadadri Bhuvanagiri district, about 40 km from Hyderabad, and police arrested the accused on May 11, Wednesday. Choutuppal police said that after raping and killing the woman, the accused, E Harish Goud, escaped by jumping a wall after stealing a few ornaments on her body.
According to Assistant Commissioner of Police N Uday Reddy, the victim and her husband, belonging to Nagarkurnool district, had migrated to Choutuppal for work and were working as guards at a godown in an isolated area for the past two months. In the daytime, her husband worked as a watchman at an engineering college while the woman stayed at the godown alone, police said.
The accused, who had been working nearby, had been observing the woman for a few days, police said. On May 9, around 9 pm, Harish allegedly attacked her and injured her head when she resisted, and went on to sexually assault her. “She had identified him and said she would tell her husband and his employer. By then, she had already collapsed from injuries. He then smashed her in the head with a big log, and then sexually assaulted her again, took her jewellery and escaped,” a police official told the media.
When the woman’s husband reached the godown, he found her lying in a pool of blood. He informed the police, who registered a case and took up an investigation. Harish has been booked for rape, robbery and murder. Chouttuppal police registered a case under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. The accused was produced before a court, which sent him to judicial custody.
With IANS inputs