Taking a difficult road, she continued to study

JEYPORE:Everyday, she walks two km on the ghat road from Musaguda to Sarispadar where the welfare school is located. She is the only one among the four siblings who has continued her study.
The 14-year-old tribal girl would often go on her own in the forested route to her school, but Tuesday turned her world upside down when four “men in uniform” gang-raped her in the same jungle.
The victim lives with her mother, a sister and two brothers. They are all daily lablourers and work in farm fields in the nearby villages to earn livelihood.

Since they had no house or land of their own, the local block office allotted a dwelling unit under Indira Awas Yojana three years back. The poor family receives food grains as entitled in the BPL schemes.
Even though her father Ganesh Chati died of illness four years back, the victim pursued her dreams of studying while her mother looked after the family with help of relatives.

The victim was known to be a shy girl who worked hard on her academics. Despite poverty and social stigma, she continued to study although it has been difficult for others of the community.
This is for the first time in two decades that such heinous crime has been reported in Koraput. “The career of my sister is ruined and we have nowhere to go”, sobs her brother Bhagaban while her shocked mother demands justice for her daughter.

“The government must give exemplary punishment to the culprits by identifying them soon,” she says, while keeping a vigil on her 14-year-old daughter.
Family members said, sometimes she would venture into the local forest for collecting firewood with her family members and friends.

“It is our routine walk through Sarispadar jungle. Uniformed policemen are found at regular interval but we faced no risk,” says Sunadhar, a villager. Almost all the 100 residents of Musaguda take the 8 km route as part of their daily life but not a single incident was reported in the past.