Video Editor: Kunal Mehra
Cameraperson: Abhay Sharma
The horrific Kathua gangrape has resulted in a slew of protests across India. The chargesheet filed against the eight accused in the case mentions some grave details of how the eight-year-old victim was held in a temple and gangraped repeatedly. The minor was sedated, raped, sedated again and then gangraped only to be bludgeoned to death just to prove a point and drive a nomadic community, the Bakarwals, out of the state.
Sanji Ram, one of the key accused, conspired with SPO Deepak Kanjuria and a juvenile, to "dislodge” the Bakarwal Muslim nomads from Rasana village in Kathua near Jammu.
The 18-page chargesheet lists the gruesome details of the crime. We at The Quint consciously took the decision to read out these details, to ensure the crime is never forgotten, never pardoned.
On 8 January, 2018, while a juvenile was busy working in the field, another accused namely Deepak Khajuria called him near a tubewell and offered him cigarettes. Deepak lured him to kidnap the Bakarwal girl on the assurance that he would help him in passing the board exams.
Sanji Ram spoke to his nephew, the juvenile who is also an accused in the case, to kidnap the Bakarwal girl. The chargesheet says that Sanji Ram directed the juvenile to execute the plan of kidnapping, and to give some intoxicant to the girl and thereafter confine her to Devisthan.
"Khajuria lured the juvenile to kidnap the girl on the assurance that he will help him clear the board examination (through cheating). Subsequently, he shared the plan, worked out by Ram and Khajuria, with Parvesh Kumar alias 'Mannu', his close friend, and asked for his help in executing the plan," the chargesheet stated.
Breaking his silence on the issue, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said that the guilty won’t be spared. Speaking at the inauguration of the Ambedkar Memorial in New Delhi, the prime minister asserted that “daughters will get justice”, and the government will ensure that happens.
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