Woman alleges rape by driver on pvt bus to Noida

Noida: A 25-year-old woman travelling with her two children from Pratapgarh to Noida was allegedly gagged and raped on a moving bus by one of its two drivers in the early hours of Wednesday when 12 other passengers on board were fast asleep.
The crime, police said, happened somewhere between Lucknow and Mathura around 3am. The woman managed to call her husband who, along with his friend, confronted the accused when the bus reached Sector 62 in the morning. Though the main accused managed to flee, cops have arrested the second driver. Efforts are on to nab the other bus staff, police said.
The woman had boarded the double-decker private sleeper bus around 4.30pm from Pratapgarh on Tuesday along with her two sons — a seven-year-old and a five-year-old — for Noida, where her husband works. Around 8pm, she was asked by the bus staff to move to a rear seat from the front sleeper, which she and her children had been occupying.
“They told me to pay either Rs 500 or vacate the sleeper at the front. I told them I would be able to pay them only after reaching Noida, but they insisted on upfront payment. So, I moved to the last seat with my children. Subsequently, we fell asleep,” the woman told TOI.
She said she woke up around 3am on Wednesday, and to her horror, found one of the two drivers of the bus, Deepak, sleeping next to her.
“I tried to raise an alarm, but he tied my hands with my dupatta and stifled my mouth with his hand, and forced himself upon me. He even threatened to kill me if I told anyone, so I kept quiet. At the time, my sons were sleeping next to me, while other passengers were also fast asleep inside their cabins,” she alleged.
After Deepak left the seat, the woman called her husband. “The second driver, the conductor and the cleaner asked me to take some money and settle the matter. They were all involved in trying to influence me not to complain about the crime,” she said.
Police were subsequently informed and an FIR was lodged at Sector 20 police station against the two drivers — Deepak and Rattan — under IPC sections 376 (rape) and 506 (criminal intimidation). Sector 20 SHO Rakesh Kumar Singh said Rattan has been arrested, while Deepak was on the run. However, Deepak’s mother said her son too had been detained.
While a preliminary medical examination of the woman was done at the district hospital in Sector 30, police got a medical board constituted under the chief medical superintendent for an examination. Police said they were also questioning some passengers who were on board the bus at the time of the crime. The bus, owned by Ram Kumar from Baghpat, has been seized for forensic examination. DCP (women’s safety) Vrinda Shukla said that teams have been formed to nab others involved in the crime. “We are also looking for the owner of the bus,” she said.