Close To Police Post in UP, Noida Woman, Daughter Gang-Raped For 3 Hours

Bulandshahr: A woman from Noida and her 14-year-old daughter were allegedly dragged out of their car and gang-raped by a group of men for three hours near a highway in Uttar Pradesh's Bulandshahr, just 65 km from Delhi.

The incident took place on Friday -- barely 100 meters from a police post. This evening, the Akhilesh Yadav government suspended the top rung of the local police and -- seven officers.

The women were travelling to Shahjahanpur with their family on Friday night. Soon after they entered Bulandshahr, their car was hit with an iron rod. When the driver rammed the brakes, the car was taken at gunpoint by five men and driven to a nearby swamp, where it got stuck.

The family was robbed. And then the men were allegedly tied up. The woman, 35, and her daughter was dragged away, and gangraped for three hours, said a senior police officer from Bulandshahr.  

They were rescued by the police hours later -- around 5.30 am.

With the highway connecting Delhi to Kanpur and a police post just 100 metres from the spot where the car was stopped, there were questions on why the police failed to intervene.

"The victims said they saw a police car patrolling, but the car was far away and the police couldn't hear their call for help," said the state police chief Javed Ahmed.

Faced with criticism for law and order situation in his state, chief minister Akhilesh Yadav rushed the state's top police officers to Bulandshahar, asking them to arrest the accused within 24 hours. The investigation will be monitored by the principal secretary.

Five men have been detained, three of whom have been identified by the family, Mr Ahmed said. The police have also zeroed in on the main accused, for whom a manhunt is on at Bulandshahr and Meerut. The accused will be tried under the National security Act, the state's top bureaucrat has said.