assaulted with iron rods

The male friend of the 23-year-old gang-rape victim who was accompanying her and was brutalised by the six men inside a moving bus identified one of the accused, Mukesh, during a Test Identification Parade (TIP) at Tihar Central Jail here on Thursday.

According to a Tihar Jail official, the 28-year-old software engineer identified Mukesh during the exercise which lasted close to an hour. Eleven men were paraded before him.

Sources claimed that while in jail, Mukesh was roughed up by some inmates.

Earlier on Wednesday, he had consented to present himself for a TIP. He, along with two other accused, Pawan Kumar and Vinay Sharma, was produced in a city court. The court later sent him to judicial custody.

The victim’s friend, who was also assaulted with iron rods, had told the police that he had boarded a “contract carriage” bus along with the girl at Munirka on Outer Ring Road. The girl was later gang-raped and both of them were assaulted with iron rods and thrown out of the moving bus. Accused Mukesh was allegedly driving the vehicle.

Kumar and Sharma, who confessed to their involvement in the gruesome incident before the court, had refused a TIP and were remanded in four-day police custody.

Police sources said they plan to move the court on Friday seeking police remand of Mukesh, to verify the purported revelations made by the other accused persons, including Mukesh’s brother Ram Singh.

A police team that had been dispatched to Aurangabad to look out for another accused Akshay Thakur questioned his family members to ascertain his whereabouts. The police claimed that they have come across some definite clues.

In another related development, protests and solidarity marches were taken out in different parts of Delhi. The All India Students’ Association and the Revolutionary Youth Association held a candlelight vigil against the Delhi Police and the government outside Safdarjung Hospital where the girl is battling for life.

At the same venue, a silent protest was organised by the Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union (JNUSU).

Demanding justice for the victim, some students of Jamia Millia Islamia university also lit candles near the auditorium.