Two held for impregnating minor girl in Tamil Nadu's Ranipet

RANIPET: Two persons, including the father of two children, were held by the police on the charges of impregnating a minor girl in Ranipet during the lockdown period, sources said.

The All Woman Police in Ranipet town registered an FIR on Thursday following a complaint from the 15-year-old victim. The cops nabbed S Sathish, 21, of Chinnammapet, Chakkaramallur, Ranipet district, and M Ezhumalai, 46, of Athamangalam Pudhur, Polur Taluk, Tiruvannamalai district.

They were booked under sections 5 (aggravated penetrative sexual assault) J (ii) (making female child pregnant) r/w 6 (punishment for aggravated penetrative sexual assault) of Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012.

“Both Sathish and Ezhumalai were produced before the special court for POCSO Act cases in Vellore city on Thursday and subsequently remanded to judicial custody at the district prison in Arakkonam,” a police officer said on Friday.

The girl had completed Class X and went along with her mother for construction work due to poverty, the source stated. Sathish, an electrician, and Ezhumalai, a mason, lured the girl and were in illicit intimacy with her in April last year. They got acquainted with her while she went for masonry work along with her mother at Chakkaramallur.

When the girl fell ill frequently, her parents took her recently to a local hospital where the doctors confirmed her pregnancy. “The girl is in the ninth month of her pregnancy,” said the officer.

A police team led by Inspector AD Vasuki registered a case after a complaint was lodged on Thursday. The team swung into action to nab the perpetrators. They added the mason, Ezhumalai had two children born to her first wife, and later he married another woman.