Barbil: Police Monday arrested a youth on the charge of raping a mentally-challenged minor tribal girl at Ulliburu village under Barbil police limits in Keonjhar district Sunday evening.
The accused was identified as Aizul Sardar of West Bengal.
According to sources, one Kamaljit Singh Ahluwalia owns Sri Jagannath Steel and Power Plant at Ulliburu village. Many private parties from outside the state have taken the contract of Jupiter thermal insulation in the plant.
The company had Saturday engaged five insulators from West Bengal. Within one day of their appointment, Sardar committed the heinous crime while the girl had gone out to relieve herself Sunday evening. Finding the girl alone, Sardar is said to have taken her to a bush where he outraged her modesty.
The girl returned home crying and narrated her ordeal to her parents who brought the matter to the notice of the village panchayat. Irate locals overpowered Sardar and one of his friends and thrashed them black and blue before handing them over to the police.
Barbil police rescued the two and launched a probe. After preliminary investigation, Sardar was arrested and produced in a court. The incident spread tension among the locals who accused the company of hiring contractors and workers from outside the state although many locals are available to do similar work.
The locals claimed that those coming from outside are mostly anti-socials with criminal records, fleeing their states and coming to Orissa on the pretext of work and possibly to evade arrest in their home states.
Many of their identity proofs are duplicates which proved they were criminals and frauds, locals added. They have showed their true colour within one day of their appointment, locals said and blamed the plant authorities for the incident.
They alleged that despite such repeated behaviour, no action has been taken against such workers and the plant authorities. PNN
