A 25-year-old man, was arrested in Tamil Nadu on November 2 for raping his minor sister-in-law and taking objectionable pictures of her. The girl’s family is from Basirhat in Bengal, around 120km from Kolkata. The crime took place in the first week of August 2020 and the girl’s father had lodged a complaint in December 2020 in Hemnagar coastal police station.

The accused Saiful Sardar, alias Saifulla Dhali was brought to Bengal on a transit remand and produced at a Basirhat court in North 24-Parganas district on Friday. The court sent him to five days’ police custody. Goa: Kidnapped And Raped, Minor Girl Attempts Suicide, One Arrested

The complainant had been living in Tamil Nadu with his family — wife and three daughters. He and his wife worked in a brick kiln in Anthiyur in Erode district. Saiful Sardar worked in an adjacent kiln, the police said

According to the police the accused befriended the eldest daughter of the complainant and they got married in 2016. In August last year, Sardar allegedly took the middle sister to a house where he raped her and took objectionable pictures. After the alleged incident the family, including the eldest daughter, left Tamil Nadu and came back to their home in Bengal.

The girl’s father lodged a police complaint after Sardar shared the pictures with a resident of the same village in North 24-Parganas who allegedly circulated the pictures.

The biggest challenge for the police was to trace the accused in the absence of any documents as apart from an old passport-sized picture, they had nothing on sardar said the investigating officer.

Though A police team from Hemnagar visited the brick kilns in Tamil Nadu’s Anthiyur in September this year, they returned empty-handed, barring some phone numbers. 

Back in Bengal, a call tracker system revealed a “Saiful Sardar” as the user of one of the phone numbers. The WhatsApp image attached to the number bore similarities with the picture police had of sardar. The victim confirmed the picture was that of the accused.

A police team reached Tamil Nadu again on November 2. Tracking the tower location with help from the local police, Sardar was traced to another brick kiln in Vangal in Karur district, from where he was arrested.

The man has been charged with relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Pocso) Act, 2012.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Nov 08, 2021 06:24 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).