MUMBAI: A 55-year-old woman was allegedly raped inside an empty compartment of a long-distance train at Bandra railway terminus in the intervening night between Saturday and Sunday. The Railway Protection Force (RPF) and the Govt Railway Police (GRP) arrested the accused Sunday morning. Police said that the accused is a labourer and they are still verifying the sequence of events leading to the incident.
The RPF has placed one of its personnel under suspension as he had been assigned to monitor the section where the alleged crime took place.
The woman, who hails from north India, had come to Mumbai for sightseeing with her son-in-law. Their acquaintance in Mumbai took them around the city, but could not arrange for a place for them to sleep overnight. The woman and her son-in-law slept at Bandra Terminus. They went over to platform 6/7, which is isolated.
It is not clear how the accused took the victim with him to an empty train where she was allegedly sexually assaulted. A passer-by alerted her son-in-law who was asleep, but the accused had fled by then. Later, the woman complained to the GRP.
CCTV footage from the terminus was examined by the police. Later, the accused re-entered Bandra Terminus and was detained from the same empty train at 5 am.
Police said the accused lives on the footpath. While he claimed his name was Rahul Shaikh, the police are verifying if this is his true identity.
(The victim's identity has not been revealed to protect her privacy as per Supreme Court directives on cases related to sexual assault)
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