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28 March 2024

US female tourist hitch-hikes ride with truckers in India... gang-raped

Published
By AFP

Indian police investigating the gang-rape of a US tourist by a group of truckers said Wednesday they had identified the type of vehicle used in the attack and collected forensic evidence.

The 30-year-old American hitched a lift in the truck Monday night in Manali, a tourist destination in the foothills of the Himalayas, after struggling to find a taxi to return to her hotel.

The driver and two accomplices then abducted her and took her to a secluded spot where they raped her for over an hour, she told police. "She is recovering fast and helping us move forward with the investigation. She has given us details of how the men looked, what they were wearing, which will help us," senior police officer V.K. Dhawan told AFP by phone.

"She has identified the truck type. It is typically used to transport construction materials so we are checking construction sites to see which trucks were in use at that time," he added. 


Police also have forensic evidence and have identified tyre marks from the site where the attack occurred, Dhawan added.
The incident follows the alleged rape of a 21-year-old Irish charity worker in the eastern city of Kolkata at the weekend and comes as India tries to fight widespread sex
crime with tougher laws.

More than 2,000 trucks a day ply the Manali highway which connects the town with remote Himalayan villages.
The woman, who cannot be identified under Indian law, is staying at a hotel under police protection in the Manali area, some 500 kilometres (300 miles) north of the capital New Delhi.

The victim told police she would meet US embassy officials later on Wednesday, Dhawan said.
Mass protests erupted across India in December and January following the fatal gang-rape of a student on a bus in New Delhi, a crime which brought simmering anger among women to the surface.

A survey by an Indian trade body this year found the number of female tourists visiting the country had dropped by 35 percent following several sex attacks that made global headlines.

Measures passed by Indian lawmakers in March increased punishments for sex offenders to include the death penalty if a victim dies and a minimum 20-year prison sentence for gang-rape.

Cops arrest man for rape of Irish woman at charity bash

Police said Wednesday they have arrested a man accused of raping an Irish woman who volunteered at a children's charity in the Indian city of Kolkata.
The local businessman who was arrested will be produced in court later Wednesday, according to a police official, who said he could not be named because he wasn't authorized to speak to reporters.

The man attended a party the woman hosted to celebrate her 21st birthday late Friday, the official said. She later went to the man's house where she drank a cup of tea and passed out, then she was raped, the official said.

Few other details were immediately available.

The reported assault comes as other attacks against women have heightened concerns about sexual violence in India.
On Tuesday, police reported that an American tourist was gang-raped in the northern Indian resort town of Manali. Three men picked her up in a truck while she was hitchhiking, then drove to a secluded spot and raped her, police officer Sher Singh said.

No arrests had been made as of Tuesday afternoon, Singh said.
In March, six men were arrested in the gang-rape of a Swiss cyclist, and a British hotel guest jumped from a third-floor window fearing a sexual attack when the hotel owner tried to force his way into her room.

The fatal gang-rape of an Indian student in New Delhi in December sparked protests demanding better protection for women. The government in response passed a law increasing prison terms for rape and making voyeurism, stalking, acid attacks and the trafficking of women punishable under criminal law.