Minor molested by ragpicker in Bengaluru, accused arrested

Bengaluru, June 3: A five-year-old girl was sexually abused here by a rag-picker on Saturday, police said, adding the accused had been arrested after being identified from CCTV footage and admitted to the crime.

The attack came when the girl went out of her shelter to relieve herself.

"As per her mother, the incident happened around 2 a.m., when the victim came out of the tent, where she stays with her," Bengaluru Commissioner of Police Praveen Sood told reporters here.

On a tip-off by a local that a girl was lying near his house, police officers on night beat rushed to the spot and got her admitted in the State-run Bowring Hospital in the city centre for treatment.

She had a head injury.

"The medical officer on duty, however, noticed bleeding from her private parts, too," said Sood.

Coincidentally, when the beat police went to the spot to search for the accused, they found the mother searching for the girl.

"We are waiting for the victim to recover from her head injury to record her statement and find out if there were more than one offender," added Sood.

Meanwhile, police launched a massive hunt for the accused and zeroes in Veeresh, a ragpicker from a village in Chitradurga district who stays near the victim, after he was spotted in a closed-circuit television camera footage in the area.

"A scratch mark on Veerash's face gave us a clue that he was the accused involved in the crime alone after interrogating some people staying in the tents in the vicinity," Deputy Commissioner of Police Bengaluru (East) Ajay Hilori told IANS.

Veeresh, 24, was apprehended and arrested. He had taken the girl to an isolated place to commit the crime and escaped afterwards, abandoned the victim on the road.

On a complaint by her mother, police registered a case against Veeresh under Section 376 of the Indian Penal Code and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act.