Cops arrest collegian after engg student alleges drink-spike rape
Times of India | 2 January 2025
12 Kolkata: A 20-year-old college student was arrested outside a south Kolkata mall on Tuesday after a female friend accused him of raping her at a house party in Garfa two weeks ago. The boy's parents, however, claimed that he was innocent.
The girl, an engineering student, complained that she suspected the youth spiked her drink and raped her when she lost consciousness for 40 minutes at a friend's apartment on Dec 21. They later dropped her home on her scooter. She alleged that it took her some time to gather courage to lodge the complaint on Dec 31. The youth was arrested after the girl called him to meet her outside a Kasba mall, where police were waiting for him.
"We have arrested the youth based on her complaint. The girl has undergone a medical examination, but we are yet to get the complete report. She will soon record her confessional statement before the magistrate," said a police officer. The final-year BCom student was produced before an Alipore court on Wednesday, where he was remanded in police custody till Jan 4.
The girl alleged that he and the accused were school friends but lost touch. Recently, they reconnected over social media and started meeting. "The girl said when they met on Dec 21 at a friend's flat, the youth insisted she drink alcohol, and thereafter, when she became drowsy, she was raped by the youth between 10.05 pm and 10.45 pm. We have started a case of rape and causing hurt by means of spiking or poisoning," said the officer.
At Alipore court, the youth's counsel said he was innocent and being framed. "The woman has herself written in the complaint that she is not sure but thinks she was raped in the washroom where she had passed out for some time. She says she lost consciousness, and when she was back in her senses, she found her undergarment in her shorts pocket, which made her feel she was raped. And even then, she came back home with the same boy, and just two days before lodging the complaint, she asked the youth for two passes for a musical event at a college fest. What took her so many days to complain, and who asks for passes from one's predator?" the youth's counsel, Ruby Mukherjee, argued in court.
Mukherjee added that on Dec 21, the girl herself drove the youth to the friend's Garfa apartment. She also paid for the liquor they got delivered online, although she told police that she was asked to do so by the accused. The youth's father, a musician and an accountant, said before the complaint was lodged, he was threatened by the girl's mother. He even submitted two voice messages before the court that recorded the conversation between his son and the girl on Dec 29, where the youth was asking the girl why her mother was threatening him while the girl kept asking him to arrange a couple of passes for a musical event.
"If my son did something bad to her, why would she casually call him to ask for passes? She called him again on Tuesday and asked him to meet her at Rabindra Sadan crossing in the morning. When he went there, three of her friends beat him up, and he ran away. The girl called him again in the evening and when he went to meet her outside a Kasba mall, he was arrested," the youth's father told TOI.