After more than a month of a 12 year old girl being found abandoned at Ghansoli railway station whose medical reports confirmed rape, the accused has been arrested. The accused identified as Mukesh Khagendra Nepali alias Sameer alias Salim (20), was arrested by Vashi police and was found from the custody of Koparkhairane police who was placed in the cell at Vashi police station itself. All the while Vashi police wherein the case of rape was registered were hunting for the accused were unaware that the accused were present in their police station’s cell under the custody of Koparkhairane police.
Koparkhairane police station being run from a rented space has no provision for keeping the accused under custody and hence the accused are kept at Vashi police station when under custody. The accused Nepali was arrested by Koparkhairane police in once such case of molestation was in custody with them and was placed at the cell in Vashi police station.
The victim girl from Daighar, was reported missing from her residence on January 23 and was found from Ghansoli railway station on January 26. The victim was found crying alone on the platform at Ghansoli railway station when the police personnel on patrol duty questioned her, the victim seemed to be clueless about her or her family. GRP took the victim into custody and started the procedures of getting her admitted to a shelter home. They got her medical done for the same and found that she was raped. While at a shelter home, she was counselled and her statement was recorded and it was found that the victim who was a special child, had somehow reached Vashi railway station and was raped near the bushes around the railway station and after the incident she boarded another train and reached Ghansoli railway station. The case was registered with Vashi police on February 13 and a sketch of the accused was made as per the description by the victim. the victim identified the accused as ‘Saleem’ who raped her and his friend a transgender identified as ‘Chaaya’ who assaulted her.
Vashi police started looking for the accused. Meanwhile, on February 25, the accused was arrested by Koparkhairane police in another molestation case and was placed in the cell of Vashi police station. In the course of investigation by Vashi police, they circulated the sketch of the accused to various police stations. “Koparkhairane police informed that they have a similar looking accused but he was named Mukesh and not Saleem. They told us that he was in our cell itself and we got him identified by the victim and found that Mukesh was Saleem. Chaaya is still wanted in the case,” a police officer from Vahsi police station said. According to police, Nepali was a scrap collector and is suspected to have sexually abused more girls.
The accused was presented before the court on Wednesday and was remanded to judicial custody.
