Police recover victim’s mobile phone

Chandigarh, November 23

The UT police have managed to recover the 22-year-old gang rape victim’s mobile phone from Mohali, according to sources. However, the police denied having recovered the phone.

The phone was snatched by the accused after raping her.

The sources said the mobile phone was put on surveillance by the police. The moment it got switched on, UT cops reached the spot and recovered the mobile phone from a man. The sources said the person from whom the mobile phone was recovered claimed that it was lying abandoned. The police are interrogating the person suspecting that he is known to the accused.Meanwhile, the police have now started questioning financiers who are into business of financing autos in the city since it is suspected that the auto had a temporary number and may have been financed in the recent past.

“We are contacting financiers and showing them pictures of the accused so that they can be identified,” said police sources. People who own a large number of autos that are further given on rent to auto drivers are also being interrogated by the police. The police have verified close to 3,500 auto-rickshaw drivers.

The victim, a native of Dehradun, had hired an auto from Sector 37 for Mohali when she was gangraped in a forest area at Sector 53. 

The police sources said a hunt for the auto and the accused had also been launched in Mohali. “Auto drivers in Mohali are being shown photographs of the accused to get a clue about their identities,” said the sources. 

The Police Department, that is desperate to crack the case, has already announced a reward of Rs 1 lakh for providing information that leads to the arrest of the accused. Besides, the policeman who arrests the accused will also be considered for an out-of-turn promotion. The police have released posters carrying photos of the three accused, which are being circulated and pasted across the city and the surrounding areas.

Apart from pasting the posters at public places, they are also being pasted on auto-rickshaws plying on city roads. 

The police are also collecting information about the people released from jail in neighboring states. 

Many addresses turn out to be fake The police are verifying the owners of auto-rickshaws with temporary numbers. Based on the initial number of the auto, the police have gathered information about the owners from auto agencies. The police have visited the addresses provided by the agencies and have found that many are registered on fake addresses. — TNS

No lessons learnt

The Chandigarh Police did not learn a lesson from the gang rape of a call centre employee by an auto driver and his accomplice that was reported almost 11 months ago. Both cases have similarities. While the police had claimed to have arrested one of the accused in the case reported earlier, the second one was neither arrested nor identified. The auto used in the crime was also not recovered that had raised serious doubts over the first arrest made by the police. The case still remains unsolved.