Badlapur Sex Assault Case: 10-Point Summary
Badlapur: Huge protests had broken out over the sex assault of two four year old girls
New Delhi:
The accused in the Badlapur sex assault case died in a shooting today after he snatched a gun from a policeman. The accused, Akshay Shinde, 23, had sexually assaulted two four-year-old girls in kindergarten. Parents had held huge protests.
Here’s your 10-point cheat sheet to this big story
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Akshay Shinde worked as a cleaner in the school in Badlapur city in Maharashtra’s Thane district. He was arrested on August 17. He allegedly assaulted the two children in the school toilet.
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The parents of one of the two nursery students, who was sexually assaulted, had said they got to know about the horrific crime only after the parents of the other nursery student told them they would file a police case.
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What’s more shocking, the parents had said, was the police’s long delay in filing the first information report (FIR) – while the sexual assault happened on August 13, the police filed the case only on August 16.
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A huge protest had broken out in Thane over the sexual assault. They alleged the school of trying to brush the matter under the carpet. Thousands of protesters had flocked to the local train station in Badlapur and blocked rail movement.
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The parents and other protesters had demanded the death penalty for the 23-year-old accused.
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Lawyer Ujjwal Nikam, a Padma Shri awardee, who has worked on high-profile murder and terrorism cases including the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, was appointed special public prosecutor in the case.
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The Bombay High Court took up the case on its own (suo moto). “If schools are not a safe place… then what is the point of talking about the right to education?” the high court said in a scathing observation.
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Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde promised to take action against the school, and fast-track the case. The state government ordered all schools to install CCTVs within a month.
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If any school refuses to install CCTVs within the time period fixed by the government, their licences would be withdrawn, the state government had said.
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In the school where the two children were sexually assaulted, all the CCTV cameras were not working and the recordings for the 15 days prior to the assault were found missing.
