With the rape victim set on fire in Unnao on Thursday still battling for her life in the Trauma Centre of Safdarjung Hospital in New Delhi, the Uttar Pradesh government constituted a five-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the shocking incident.
“I visited the spot in Unnao on Thursday evening and constituted a five-member SIT led by Unnao ASP Vinod Pandey. The team will probe all aspects of the case and submit a report to me,” Divisional Commissioner of Lucknow Mukesh Meshram told media persons.
Meshram, along with IG (Lucknow Range) SK Bhagat visited the spot and submitted their report to the government on Thursday night.
He, however, did not disclose the time-frame given to the SIT to submit its report. The report will come to me soon and I will forward it to the government,” Meshram said.
The condition of the victim is extremely critical and she is on ventilator, doctors attending to her disclosed in New Delhi.
Meanwhile, a day after the rape victim was set on fire, her uncle alleged that he had been threatened with “dire consequences” by the relatives of the accused.
The victim’s uncle, who lives in a rented house in Unnao and runs a small shop, told reporters that a relative of accused Shivam had called him and threatened that he would have to face “dire consequences”.
“Your shop will be set on fire and (we) will not let you live,” the victim’s uncle described the caller as saying.
“I am going to inform the police and demand action in this regard,” he said.
When asked about the threat, Superintendent of Police Vikrant Veer said, “An information was received in this regard that a distant relative of the victim was threatened. We are making arrangements for his security and there will be no laxity in it.”
When asked whether the person who received the threat was the victim’s uncle or her distant relative, the SP said, “It does not matter. We will provide him security.”
The rape survivor, who suffered serious burns after being set on fire allegedly by five men, including two of the rape accused, on Thursday morning, was airlifted to Safdarjung Hospital in Delhi, where her condition was stated to be critical.
The woman, who was allegedly raped in December last year, was on her way to a Rae Bareli court early on Thursday morning when she was attacked and set on fire. She ran as a ball of fire for a while before people saw her and informed the police, who sent her to a community health centre, from where she was sent to the district hospital, before being referred to Lucknow.
The five men, who have been arrested for the alleged assault on her life, are Harishankar Trivedi, Ram Kishore Trivedi, Umesh Bajpai, Shivam and Shubham Trivedi. Of the five, Shivam and Shubham Trivedi are accused in the rape case. One of them was arrested and subsequently released on bail.
Meanwhile reports said that the 23-year-old rape survivor, in her FIR earlier lodged in the rape case with the Lalganj police in March this year alleged that she was kept as a sex slave by the accused before being thrown out. The accused also threatened her to post her videos if she went to the police.
Not paying heed to these threats, she went ahead and filed two FIRs — the first with Bihar Bahta police (Unnao) on March 5 and the second the next day with Lalgunj (Rae Bareli) police.
The FIR stated that whenever she looked out of the house, she was beaten up and raped again. She alleged that Shivam Trivedi (main accused) lured her with a marriage proposal and she accompanied him to Lalgunj where he planned to marry her but was raped instead. The act was recorded on his mobile phone.
She alleged that he would threaten her to post the video online and rape her again.
He kept her in a rented room and a strict vigil was maintained. He told her that he would kill her if she ever dared to venture out. He regularly changed houses and cities.
According to the FIR, on January 19, 2018, she finally confronted Shivam and asked him to marry her as he promised. Shivam took her to a Rae Bareli court and prepared a marriage contract. After keeping her in Rae Bareli for a month on the pretext of marrying her soon, he dumped her in the village a month later. This time, he threatened her that he would kill her and her family members.
The survivor took refuge in her aunt’s house in Rae Bareli. Shivam somehow managed to get her address and reached there. He again promised to marry her and even took her to a temple where he took a pledge for the same before a deity. But on the way back, Shivam and his brother Shubham dragged her in a field and raped her at gunpoint.
In the FIR, she also mentioned that she approached the Rae Bareli police but they did not file her complaint. Only after the intervention of the court, an FIR was lodged under sections 376D (gang rape) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code first at Bihar Bahta police station on March 5, 2019 and then at Lalganj on March 6, 2019. .
