Italian Banker Allegedly Raped By Tour Guide In A Car In Mumbai

A 37-year-old banker from Italy has accused a tour guide of raping her in a cab in Mumbai's Juhu on June 14, a senior police officer said on Sunday. The police said the rape survivor in her complaint filed on Friday mentioned that she had taken a bus for a sightseeing tour of the city on June 14 when she met the accused.

"She met the accused during the bus tour on June 14. He introduced himself as a tour guide and the woman hired him," a police officer said.

After the bus tour ended at 7pm in Juhu that day, the accused offered to show the woman the bungalow of actor Amitabh Bachchan, which was in the area, the police said.

"He then promised to drop her to the hotel in Colaba where she was staying. A cab was booked by the accused and the complainant has told us that he stopped the vehicle nearby to buy liquor," the police officer said.

"She has said that the accused forced her to consume alcohol and also touched her inappropriately. He then raped her in the car," the police officer told news agency Press Trust of India.

The police said the woman approached the Italian embassy, which asked her to file a case with the Mumbai police. The woman gave her statement to Colaba police station, which later transferred the case to Juhu police station.

"A rape case has been filed and police teams are searching for the accused. Investigation is on," said a police officer in Juhu.

The woman came to India in December last year.

India is the world's most dangerous country for women due to the high risk of sexual violence and being forced into slave labour, according to a poll of global experts released earlier this week. War-torn Afghanistan and Syria ranked second and third in the Thomson Reuters Foundation survey of about 550 experts on women's issues, followed by Somalia and Saudi Arabia.

The only western nation in the top 10 was the United States, which ranked joint third when respondents were asked where women were most at risk of sexual violence, harassment and being coerced into sex.

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