Two twin brothers were arrested by the Thiruvallam police in Kerala's Thiruvananthapuram for allegedly sexually abusing two minor girls, related to them, who were living in their neighbourhood. The arrest took place on Sunday after it came to light that the duo, Shihab* and Saifudeen*, were allegedly involved in sexually assaulting the sisters when their parents went for work. The two girls are aged 5 and 10 years old. The police said that the parents used to leave the children in their care while going to work as the twins and the children's father were related.
"The girl's father is working and mother would also step out for work during the day. The abuse had been going for days, is what we have come to understand. It came to light when their mother developed a doubt. The complaint was filed on Saturday," Thiruvallom Inspector Sajikumar told TNM.
The accused, both of whom run their own business, have been booked under relevant sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act and were presented in front of a local court before being sent to remand for 14 days.
Though not related to this incident, the Kerala police has been conducting raids across the state against online child sex offenders as part of Operation P Hunt. On Monday, the police arrested 41 persons who were allegedly viewing and circulating child sexual abuse material through the internet.
The simultaneous raids conducted on October 4 led to the seizure of 285 devices, which includes mobile phones, modems, hard disks, memory cards, laptops and computers. The police said that they had registered 268 cases under the Information Technology (IT) Act and POCSO Act. Many of those who were caught, worked in the IT sector.
“We decided to crack down on these offenders, many of whom worked in the IT field. Hence the Kerala Police Countering Child Sexual Exploitation (CCSE) team, under the Cyberdome, which deals with cybersecurity, collected IP addresses of these users with specialised software. Users sharing such pictures on social media handles were also traced," Manoj Abraham, Nodal Officer of Kerala Police Cyberdome told TNM earlier.
*Names changed