In a gut-wrenching crime that has come to light in Ghaziabad, a mother would torture her 10-year-old daughter to cover up her repeated rape by a male friend and also wanted to push her into prostitution, officials said. The man allegedly sexually abused the girl’s 13-year-old brother as well.

Police officials said that, unable to put up with the abuse any longer, the child had left her home in Ghaziabad on January 20 and was found roaming the streets of Delhi. She was handed over to the Delhi Police, who entrusted her to the care of the Child Welfare Committee. The girl’s medical test revealed that she had been raped.

The child told officials her father had died four years ago and was living with her maternal grandparents since then. Last year, her mother had taken the siblings to her home in Ghaziabad. She was repeatedly sexually assaulted by her mother’s friend, who had also sexually abused her 13-year-old brother. Her brother had left home because of the abuse. 

The girl said the last straw for her was when she found out that her mother was involved in prostitution after her father’s death and also wanted to push her into the trade when she got older.

The child’s mother and her friend have been arrested, said an official from the Loni Border police station in Ghaziabad.

Assistant Commissioner of Police (Loni) Bhaskar Sharma said, “The girl has identified her rapist as Raju, a resident of Delhi. The mother had not filed a missing complaint even after she went missing on January 20. The child said her mother and Raju would torture her to cover up the crime and would threaten her using pliers to make sure she did not tell anybody about it.

“A case was initially registered by the Delhi Police in January and then at the Loni Border Police Station on April 9. The girl was so scared of Raju that she had initially said she had been raped by her stepfather,” he added.

Nationalist Congress Party (SP) supremo Sharad Pawar on Thursday countered Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar’s appeal to Baramati voters to elect the “daughter-in-law of the Pawars” with an “original” versus “outsider” comment.

The Deputy Chief Minister had recently asked people to vote for his wife Sunetra Pawar in the Lok Sabha polls as they had “voted for the father (Sharad Pawar), son (himself) and daughter (sitting MP Supriya Sule)”.

“This time elect the daughter-in-law (Sunetra Pawar),” the NCP leader had said at a workers’ convention. Sunetra Pawar is pitted against Supriya Sule in Baramati.

Asked about the statement, Sharad Pawar said, “One is the original Pawar (referring to daughter Sule) and the other Pawar is coming from outside.”

On Ajit Pawar claiming that his cousins never campaigned for him all these years, the NCP(SP) supremo said, “It is not true. Be it my election or that of Supriya or Ajit, members of the family have gone to the public and aired their views to get support.”

Brushing aside the deputy Chief Minister’s threat that his family would not be able to show their faces if he opened his mouth, Sharad Pawar said “we are not worried about it” as the world knows about this person’s political stand and education. 

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Canada retrenched Indian staffers in India due to reduced Canadian staff. India expelled 41 diplomats for parity. Mumbai, Chandigarh consulates closed. Consular support, trade services continue. Canada maintains strong ties with Indian citizens.