GUWAHATI: One of the three suspects in the Aug 22 gang rape of a Class 10 student in Assam‘s Nagaon district drowned in a pond while trying to escape from custody during a crime scene re-enactment early Saturday, police said. Tafazul Islam‘s body was pulled out with his hands cuffed in front and a rope hanging from them, reports Prabin Kalita.
Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma confirmed the police version, while reiterating the rape as an attack on the state’s indigenous people.”The criminals who dared to commit such a heinous crime against a minor Hindu girl… will not be spared by the law. A particular community is becoming very active after the LS elections,” he had said Thursday.
On Saturday, the CM said: “In Assam, when such crimes against women occur, whatever action needs to be taken, our police take it immediately. There is no compromise…we have a zero-tolerance policy. The other two absconding (suspects) will be caught very soon.”
Residents of his Borbheti village announced that they will not “allow his burial in the community graveyard, not participate in his ‘janaza’ (burial prayers), and socially boycott his family”.
The girl was gang-raped allegedly by three men when she was returning home from her tuition classes Thursday evening. Police found her in a semi-conscious state on a desolate road and Tafazul was arrested Friday.
Nagaon SP Swapnaneel Deka said Tafazul was taken handcuffed to the location where the rape was committed for recreating the crime scene around 3.30am Saturday. “There, the accused hit the policeman holding the rope and jumped into the pond. We immediately cordoned off the area. It was dark,” Deka said, adding SDRF was informed and a search was launched. The body was found after nearly two hours, he said.
The crime happened in an area predominantly inhabited by the immigrant Muslim community. It reignited public anger against settlers from Bangladesh – a key aspect of the anti-foreigner agitation of the 1980s.
Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma confirmed the police version, while reiterating the rape as an attack on the state’s indigenous people.”The criminals who dared to commit such a heinous crime against a minor Hindu girl… will not be spared by the law. A particular community is becoming very active after the LS elections,” he had said Thursday.
On Saturday, the CM said: “In Assam, when such crimes against women occur, whatever action needs to be taken, our police take it immediately. There is no compromise…we have a zero-tolerance policy. The other two absconding (suspects) will be caught very soon.”
Residents of his Borbheti village announced that they will not “allow his burial in the community graveyard, not participate in his ‘janaza’ (burial prayers), and socially boycott his family”.
The girl was gang-raped allegedly by three men when she was returning home from her tuition classes Thursday evening. Police found her in a semi-conscious state on a desolate road and Tafazul was arrested Friday.
Nagaon SP Swapnaneel Deka said Tafazul was taken handcuffed to the location where the rape was committed for recreating the crime scene around 3.30am Saturday. “There, the accused hit the policeman holding the rope and jumped into the pond. We immediately cordoned off the area. It was dark,” Deka said, adding SDRF was informed and a search was launched. The body was found after nearly two hours, he said.
The crime happened in an area predominantly inhabited by the immigrant Muslim community. It reignited public anger against settlers from Bangladesh – a key aspect of the anti-foreigner agitation of the 1980s.
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