A minor girl from Chandoli in Uttar Pradesh was allegedly gangraped by five men in the Patna house of the Leader of the Opposition in the Jharkhand Assembly, Rajendra Prasad Singh of the Congress, on Thursday night.
One of the accused is said to be Singh’s nephew, though Singh denied any link.
The girl, aged about 15 and said to be a Class 9 student, was taken from Patna Junction railway station by two men and brought to the house in West Paten Nagar, where three others joined in raping her, said the police. All the five accused have been arrested.
“A police patrol team saw the girl lying by the road in a pitiable condition. On being questioned, she told them what happened to her and showed the house where it happened. The three accused were immediately arrested in the house and the two others were arrested later,” said Patna SP (city) Jayant Kant.
One of the accused, Neeraj Kumar, caretaker of the house, has identified himself as a nephew of Rajendra Singh, the Congress MLA from Bermo in Jharkhand, said Kant. But Singh denied having a nephew by that name.
“No such thing happened in that house where respectable families have been living on rent in the six flats for years. The police will find out the truth in the probe,” said Singh in Dhanbad.
Police sources said the girl had left her home four days earlier and a missing person case was lodged there on Wednesday.
“Finding her aimlessly roaming the railway station, possibly after getting down from some train, accused Ravi and Ranjit had brought her to the house concerned saying she could stay there for the night,” said an officer of the Shastri Nagar police station.
“The girl was in such bad shape that she was initially unable to remember anything about her home location and family, which delayed our probe,” he said.