Bhubaneswar: Seven were arrested by the police on Saturday on charges of assaulting an Army officer and harassing his fiancée on Chandaka Road in Bhubaneswar a week ago.
Sources said the seven, stated to be engineering students, had earlier been detained by the Chandaka police and were formally arrested in connection with the incident.
They were held on the basis of CCTV footage and thoroughly interrogated at Chandaka police station before being arrested. Soon after their arrest, the seven students were produced in a local court.
As many as eleven mobile phones and a vehicle have been seized from the possession of the seven arrested youths, according to ADCP Krushna Prasad Dash.
According to the complaint, over 12 people travelling in three cars intercepted the vehicle of the Indian Army officer near Patharagadia in the capital city in the late hours of September 15.
The army officer and his fiancée were returning home after closing the woman’s restaurant.
The hooligans hurled abuses at the army officer and passed lewd comments towards his fiancée. They allegedly dragged the army officer and thrashed him when he tried to resist.
The miscreants threatened the couple of dire consequences when the army officer tried to video-record the incident in this mobile phone.
The couple, somehow, managed to escape and rushed to Bharatpur police station to lodged a complaint against the miscreants. They reached Bharatpur police station at around 2 am and urged the officials to depute a police control room (PCR) van to arrest the miscreants.
The couple alleged that the Bharatpur police subjected them to torture instead of acting on their complaint. As per the complaint, the cops put the fiancée of the army officer in the custody and tortured her. It has been alleged that the police officials sexually assaulted her in the custody.
The woman reportedly bit the hand of a woman cop while trying to resist the custodial torture meted out to her.
The Bharatpur police later arrested the woman and produced her in a local court. She was sent to judicial custody after the court rejected her bail plea. She was subsequently granted bail by the court and then admitted to AIIMS-Bhubaneswar for treatment.
The alleged torture to the army officer and his fiancée by the cops has triggered a nationwide uproar.
The five police officials, including the Inspector In-Charge (IIC) of Bharatpur police station, have been placed under suspension in connection with the incident, while a Crime Branch probe into the incident is underway.
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