Four more persons have been held in connection with the alleged gangrape of a 17-year-old girl here, taking the total number of those arrested to nine.
"Late last night, the city crime branch arrested one Mustaq Mustaqim Shaikh (33), who is a native of Jalgaon district of Maharashtra, in a gangrape case filed by a 17-year-old girl yesterday. We have taken their custody today," police inspector A G Gohil of the Maninagar Police Station told PTI today.
"Today, we also arrested the owner of a city-based hotel, where the incident occurred on July 26 and July 27, as well as his two staff members," he said.
The hotel owner has been identified as Vijay Soni (65), while his two staff members have been identified as Ramesh Panchal (35) and Bharat Damor (33), who are residents of the city, the police official said.
Yesterday, the police had arrested Zafar alias Sohil Shaikh (21), Tausif Alam Tirmizi (25), Razaur Rehman Ansari (25), Mashkur Ali Alvi (23) and Sozabkhan Pathan (24), the police official said.
At least nine persons have been arrested in the case so far, the police official said.
"Mustaq, who had found the girl abandoned near Hotel Silver Springs on July 27, offered to drop her to her residence. When she said that she did not wish to go home, he took her to a hotel room and raped her," the police official said.
The police booked him under Section 376 and Section 114 of the Indian Penal Code for rape as well as abetment to crime along with other sections of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, the police official said.
On July 31, the minor girl filed a complaint that she was gangraped by him and three of his friends, while two others helped them in the act, the police official said.
The girl reportedly had gone missing on July 26 after which her father lodged a complaint of abduction at the Maninagar police station, the police official said.
In her complaint, the girl stated that the accused had lured her to a hotel in Kagdapith area of the city and raped her.
