3 Mumbai cops made accused in minor's rape case

MUMBAI: In a rare instance, a special Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Pocso) Act court on Wednesday allowed a plea to include three police officials as accused for forcing a 13-year-old girl to marry a rape accused in 2013. The minor had been gangraped, following which she became pregnant.
While the trial had commenced, with the survivor- now 20 years old-and her father deposing as witnesses against the two suspects and three others accused of abetment, based on their detailed testimonies, an application was made on their behalf by advocate Wesley Menezes to add the three cops as accused.
The three cops named are police inspector (EOW) Jaywant Shinde-then an assistant police inspector at Amboli police station; Vakola police inspector (crime) Vivek Shende, who was then an inspector; and Janita Bhosale, who was then a constable.
Menezes said the matter came to light in 2014, after a social worker noticed the survivor with a child and asked about her.
Survivor: Cops pressured me to marry rape accused
The survivor and her father’s attempts to register an FIR in 2013 were allegedly thwarted by the three cops, the two alleged rapists, the brother of one of the accused and two local youths who forced her to marry the accused.
After the social worker’s intervention in 2014, an FIR was finally registered. But unhappy with the investigation, the father moved the Bombay high court seeking transfer of probe. On July 9, 2014, the HC set up a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the case. In May 2018, the father submitted the plea to add the names of the cops as accused in the case before the special POCSO court, through Menezes.
His plea said that in the SIT’s report, names of all the individuals as accused were not added. The father’s plea also stated that on October 17, 2016, the special Pocso court framed charges against the five accused—the absconding rape accused who “married” the survivor, his brother, the other rape accused and two locals—under IPC, Pocso Act and the Child Marriage Act.
The father and daughter in their statements chronicled the events of February 2, 2013. The survivor said she went to the police station at 10am, narrated the incident to Shinde and the accused was brought there. The survivor said she was kept in a separate room and at 5pm, she was taken to Shende’s cabin where one of the locals (named as accused), the rape accused, his brother and uncle and her mother and sister were present. She said Shende told her to marry the ‘rapist’ so that her child gets a father’s name and said his family would buy her a hut and take care of the child’s expenses. The survivor said she refused, but the other two cops and accused continued to pressure her. She said one of the locals, whom she called ‘uncle’, abused her and said he would support her only if she married the accused. Shende then asked her to go home. When she came out of the cabin, she told her father that she had consented to marry the accused as everyone had pressured her.
The cops had filed their replies and denied the allegations. They have been summoned before the court on June 10.