Bharartiya Janata Party MLA Raghunandan Rao released private pictures and a video clip purported to be of the minor victim and a youngster in the case of a gang-rape in Hyderabad’s upscale Jubilee Hills area.
The MLA has urged police to clarify if the youngster in the pictures and video clip was the son of an MLA.
On May 28, a 17-year-old girl had gone to a pub in Hyderabad, where she met one of the accused and left with him and his friends in a luxury sedan, when they promised to drop her home.
The group reached a nearby café and switched to a multi-utility vehicle, and left a bakery at around 6.30 pm. The girl was then allegedly taken to an isolated spot and sexually assaulted by five people in the car, which the accused parked in Banjara Hills. She was dropped back at the pub at around 7.32 pm, which the police have CCTV footage of.
Both the cars have been seized and sent for forensic examination. The Innova was recovered from a farmhouse in Moinabad on the outskirts of Hyderabad on Saturday.
The farmhouse is owned by a woman with links with a political family and the car was used by a top Waqf board functionary as his official vehicle.
Investigators are now in the process of recording the statements of the survivor under Section 164.
Based on this, the name of other accused would be added to the FIR if needed.
While the Hyderabad police have initially arrested one man Saduddin Malik and two juveniles, another teenager believed to be the son of a Telangana politician was arrested on Sunday for his alleged role in the sexual assault.
Mr. Rao sought to know why the police kept mum about the complicity of the youngster seen in the pics and video.
The previous day, law enforcement brushed aside reports that Home Minister Mahmood Ali’s grandson and an MLA’s son were connected to the crime.
West zone DCP Joel Davis said investigators would speak with the victim again in the light of the video clip and initiate action based on inputs. ‘We are going by the statement given by the victim, and have identified the accused based on her version,’ the DCP said.
‘It was unfortunate that the MLA released the pics and video clip,’ he added.
Meanwhile, police have launched a manhunt for two more accused of involvement in the crime.
The accused allegedly tried to destroy evidence of the crime by wiping off the car, said authorities, but investigators managed to recover crucial evidence, such as biological fluid, earrings, footwear, and hair, and have sent them for forensic examination.
The police have now invoked Section 201 of the Indian Penal Code (causing the disappearance of evidence of the offence or giving false information to screen the offender) against the accused.
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