Ragging victim wants attackers punished

VISAKHAPATNAM: A day after regaining her voice, B Shamili on Wednesday demanded the police punish the girls who tried to kill her in the college hostel at Gotlam in Bondapalli mandal in Vizianagaram district on July 19. Police booked a case under section 307 (attempt to murder) of IPC and the Andhra Pradesh Ragging Act 4(1) against the accused.
Shamili said she was keen to know why her classmates - Anusha and Swathi - had attacked her on that fateful day.She believed that they attacked her because she was beautiful and good at studies. "They tried to throttle me with a rope and scratched my neck with a ring
before I fell unconscious. I was brought to the hospital, unconscious. But at the time of the attack, both Swathi and Anusha were in the hostel," Shamili told reporters before she was discharged from the ENT hospital here.
The first year Intermediate student of Gayatri Junior College underwent video-laryngoscopy at the hospital on Tuesday and got her voice back. Shamili gave a written statement to the police about the attack on her as she was unable to speak after her vocal cords got damaged in the incident. However, Shamili did not name anyone in her written statement. SP said Shamili mentioned that some students had tried to throttle her with a pillow while two others held her legs. She also did not mention whether they were inmates of the hostel or outsiders. While her parents cried foul, charging that her peers had tried to choke their 17-year-old daughter, the college authorities brushed off the incident as a mere prank.
Vizianagaram district SP Kartikeya called on Shamili two days back and enquired her about the incident. The police questioned the director of the college as to why the management had failed to lodge a complaint though the incident happened on July 19.
Around 230 students are studying in the private college and 110 girls are residing in the hostel. In Shamili's room, there are 12 girls.