Kanpur/Kannauj: The man suspected of allegedly raping a minor at a government guest house at Kannauj’s Gursahaiganj had been a juvenile offender earlier with a history of sexually assaulting minors, ThePrint has learnt.
Days after a video of a minor bleeding profusely and crying for help went viral, the police told ThePrint that they had identified the suspect as 22-year-old Ramji Verma — a resident of Khudaganj in the neighbouring Farrukhabad district.
Verma, the police said, faces at least four criminal cases, including two for sodomising and killing minor boys. He was also arrested for attempting to rape a minor girl.
All three cases date back to 2018 and occurred within a span of 17 days. Verma, a minor at that time, was sent to a correctional home in March 2018 for the attempt to rape case, the police said.
“We have identified Ramji Verma as the accused. He is a psycho[path] offender who has a history of involvement in crimes against minors and was sentenced earlier, too. He was released on bail about a year ago,” Gursahaiganj Station House Officer Raj Kumar Singh told ThePrint.
Kannauj Superintendent of Police Kunwar Anupam Singh, however, told ThePrint that he would comment on Verma’s criminal history only after his arrest.
On 23 October, the minor girl was allegedly raped and left bleeding at a PWD guest house in Kannauj’s Gursahaiganj. Verma has since been on the run. “His mobile is switched off since Sunday,” a police officer told ThePrint.
The FIR was first lodged against an unknown person under Sections 363 (kidnapping), 376/ 511 (attempt to rape), 307 (attempt to murder) of Indian Penal Code and Section 7 and 8 of the POCSO Act.
The girl, meanwhile, is currently admitted to the paediatric intensive care unit (ICU) of Kanpur’s Regency Hospital.
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‘Attacked girl repeatedly, probably thought she was dead’
On 23 October, the girl — the oldest of four siblings — went missing after she left for the local market to change a piggy bank she had purchased that day. “She’d bought two piggy banks and when she got home, she found one broken,” her father told ThePrint. “She went to the market to change it and didn’t return.”
Police sources said that Verma coaxed the girl into following him into the old desolate dak bangla — currently the PWD guest house — where he repeatedly hit her with a brick.
A Kannauj police officer privy to the investigation told ThePrint that CCTV footage from cameras at the market showed Verma talking to the girl. “It seems that the accused lured her somehow and took her towards the road behind the dak bangla. The girl didn’t initially oppose him. But when she resisted his attempts to pull her into the building premises, he repeatedly hit her head with a brick,” the officer added.
Subedar, a security guard at the dak bangla, told ThePrint that around 4 pm that day, some children grazing cattle alerted him about a child lying in a pool of blood.
“I was aghast to see the child lying in a pool of blood. Her head was bleeding profusely, and her face and head had several injuries. I rushed to the Gursahaiganj police station nearby and informed the SHO,” he said.
It took 30 minutes to return to the place, by which time a crowd had gathered, he said. “Many of them were making videos,” he added.
Manoj Pandey, the cop in charge of the local police station, took the victim to a nearby health facility, the girl’s parents said.
A police officer who saw the girl being taken to hospital told ThePrint that the suspect could have taken her for dead and escaped through the fields behind the building.
The girl’s family told ThePrint that they learnt about the incident only after 5 pm Sunday, by which time police had already reached the spot.
She was first taken to a government hospital in Tirwa, Kannauj, but later referred to Lala Lajpat Rai Hospital in Kanpur because of the seriousness of her injuries, the parents said. From there, she was taken to the Regency Hospital because she wasn’t getting appropriate medical attention, the girl’s father said.
An official from the Regency Hospital’s administration told ThePrint Wednesday that the child was brought in a critical condition. She has been in ICU for the past four days.
“The government officials will be able to comment on the allegations of sexual assault,” the official said, adding that although her vitals were stable, doctors could comment on her condition only after 48 hours.
Sources at the hospital told ThePrint that she had injuries on her private parts, head, and face.
Asked about the rape allegations, the Kannauj SP told ThePrint that an initial examination by a team of doctors ruled out rape. However, he added that forensic test results were awaited. “Whether the girl was raped or not can be confirmed only after the reports come. Preliminary examination doesn’t confirm rape,” he said.
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‘Juvenile offender, psychopath killer’
The girl’s maternal uncle told ThePrint that the family had never seen the suspect before. But after CCTV footage recovered by the police showed him talking to the child, her cousins cornered him in Khudaganj, he said.
Two CCTV footage — both in possession of ThePrint — shows Verma walking ahead of the girl at the market and later speaking to her.
“When we saw the CCTV footage, we too launched a manhunt,” he told ThePrint. “One of the cousins caught hold of [Verma] and his brother, but he managed to give him a slip. Before fleeing, he claimed that the accused was not him but his brother. His brother was detained,” he said.
Gursahaiganj SHO Raj Kumar Singh confirmed that the suspect’s older brother was questioned in connection with the case.
According to the police, this isn’t Verma’s first case of sexual assault.
On 23 February 2018, he allegedly sodomised and killed a six-year-old boy in Kamalganj, Farrukhabad. Another similar crime — the victim a five-year-old — was reported a week later. The following day, he was allegedly caught trying to rape a minor girl.
Verma was charged with IPC sections related to murder and sodomy, as well as the Protection of Children Against Sexual Offences Act in two separate First Information Reports (FIRs).
When contacted, a Kamalganj police officer told ThePrint that Verma was arrested in March 2018 in connection with the attempt to rape case.
“When he was arrested and remanded in police custody, he had admitted to his involvement in the other two cases in which two boys were sodomised and killed in Kamalganj and Kannauj Sadar. All the cases are currently going on in the juvenile justice court because he was tried as a juvenile at that time,” he said.
In Khudaganj, residents fear for the safety of their children. “He’s a known criminal here,” Lankush Verma, a resident of the village, told ThePrint.
“In March 2018, some locals from the neighbouring Gursahaiganj area had caught him red-handed trying to rape a minor girl. Nobody in the village talks to their family. No one is ready to get their daughters married to him or any of his three brothers. His father is an alcoholic,” he claimed.
A police officer of the Kamalganj police station told ThePrint that Verma escaped from police custody when he was brought to Chhibramau court on 4 March 2018.
“He was booked under Sections 376 (rape) and 511 (punishment for attempting to commit offences punishable with imprisonment) of IPC. He was caught soon after, and sent to judicial custody. He was tried as a juvenile offender,” the officer said.
According to reports, Verma was also arrested in 2017 in connection with a theft case.
‘Sharp, Insta-savvy criminal’
Verma’s Instagram profile, which ThePrint has accessed, shows him to be an active user, particularly since January this year. His last post was on 1 October.
On 14 January, Verma posted a video purportedly shot inside a juvenile correction home in Farrukhabad. An accompanying caption says that the video is from 15 August last year. “Danced our hearts out in the baccha jail [juvenile home] on August 15,” the caption reads.
Another post on 14 January shows Verma in a photo with his fellow inmates. Several other photos show him at different places in Hyderabad.
A Kannauj police officer confirmed that the Instagram profile was indeed being operated by Verma. “He is a smart, social media-savvy criminal who is only associated with sexual assault and crimes against minors. He has orchestrated two murders already and nearly killed a minor girl. He knows how to escape,” the officer said.
(Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)
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