Trampled innocence

NCPA takes action:

[email protected]

Imagine the agony of a 15 year old school girl being dragged away to a mountainous region and being raped while she was on her way to school. The terrible thing happened to an innocent girl in a village hamlet somewhere in January this year. The girl was raped not so long after she attained puberty, police said.

Despite the agony of being raped the victim with a lot of determination, and courage kept mum about the whole issue and even attended school that day as if nothing happened to her. The intriguing fact was when it was brought to the notice of Rambukkana police, it just fell on deaf years and no action was initiated to apprehend the suspect.

Since there wasn’t any action forthcoming to apprehend the suspect by the Rambukkana police, the girl on her own volition wrote to the Presidential Secretariat out lining her miserable plight, the torment, and the mental agony she underwent since being raped in January.

The Presidential Secretariat realising the serious nature of the complaint promptly referred the matter to the Chairman of the National Child Protection Authority (NCPA) and ordered an investigation to be launched into the matter.

No sooner NCPA was notified about it, its Chairman directed the NCPA’s OIC, Chief Inspector Wijesena to commence investigation immediately and submit a detailed report on the incident.

A team of police sleuths headed by Inspector Ratnayake, Inspector Bopitigedera, Sub Inspector Garmen and Police Sergeant Sarah of the NCPA were detailed on the job. When the police team visited Rabukkana area and met the victim school girl what they learnt from her shocked them all.

The alleged rapist was a young man in the employment of her father’s home to tend to his domestic elephants. The girls father was a well known personality in the area who commanded much respect from villagers.

The young man while residing at his home on an earlier occasion had made amorous overtures to befriend his eldest daughter. She was 15 years old at that time.

But his efforts to win her heart became fruitless as she did not responded to his calls. When the parents came to know about the plight of the girl they sent her nearby to a school boarding house to avoid further contact with her.

When the boy realised his folly he turned his evil eye on her sister who was around 13 years at the time. The girl had not even attended puberty during this period. According to NCPA sleuths there were several instances where the man had sexually molested the young girl during the past two years.

Although the sexual harassment was brought to the notice of the Rambukkana police, they treated the matter in a most trivial way. The lukewarm attitude taken by the police further encouraged the young man to commit more sexual harassment on the girl. Her parents too were helpless as the girl did not always complain about the sexual harassments.

However when the father came to know the young man was having a passionate fling with a woman tourist spending a holiday at their home he was furious. He then chased him away from home. Subsequently the man had joined the armed forces and had vacated post, police said.

It was somewhere in January this year that this unfortunate incident happened to the girl while she was on her way to the village school that day. The young man who arrived in a Three Wheeler Taxi in the village had spotted the smartly dressed girl walking along in the direction of the school.

Having stopped the taxi, he accosted the girl and lured her into the Taxi by promising to drop her at school. But instead of proceeding towards the school he took her to a mountainous region in the village where he allegedly raped her and later dropped her near the school. The girl however did not reveal anything to her school teachers until she decided to petition the Presidential Secretariat about her ordeal.

The NCPA sleuths who went in search of the suspect to Rambukkana area found the suspect missing from the area. However they were able to monitor his mobile cellular conversations and learnt that he was somewhere in Kadugannawa and Pilimatalawa. But efforts to locate him proved futile.

Meanwhile when NCPA sleuths informed DIG Sabaragamuwa Range, Upali Hewage about an alleged rapist on the run he detailed a team of policemen from Ratnapura, that eventually led to the arrest of the alleged rapist at Kadugannawa, a fortnight ago.

Police subsequently learnt the suspect had even caused grievous injuries to a relative of the girl victim by cutting her with a sword a few months ago. Police after conducting further inquiries into the matter had sought the assistance of the Attorney General on the alleged rape.