The Pune city police have arrested the driver of a private tourist bus for allegedly raping a 21-year-old woman in his vehicle on the intervening night of Saturday and Sunday. The police identified the accused driver as Navnath Shivaji Bhong (38).
The victim woman lodged a First Information Report (FIR) at a police station on Sunday, the police said.
A senior police officer said that the victim is a native of the Washim district of Maharashtra. She came to Pune, along with her husband, a couple of days ago in search of a job, the officer said. The couple worked as labourers and did menial jobs to earn a living, the officer added.
On June 11 (Saturday), the couple worked at a hotel and at night went to a bus depot searching for a place to stay, the police said. Bhong noticed the couple and got to know from them that they were looking for shelter, the police added.
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PremiumBhong asked them to sleep in his bus and around 3.30 am (Sunday), when the womanтАЩs husband came out of the vehicle to urinate, he started the bus and took the woman to another spot, said the police. He allegedly thrashed and raped her twice, added the police.
Bhong then allegedly forced the woman out of his vehicle. The woman later narrated the incident to her husband and the couple approached the police and lodged a rape complaint.
The police checked videos captured by the CCTV cameras around the crime scene and got clues about the private bus in which the alleged incident took place.
тАЬWe nabbed the accused while he was taking tourists to Karnataka in his private bus. Further investigation is on,тАЭ said the officer.
The police booked the accused on charges of kidnapping and rape, among others, under Indian Penal Code (IPC).
