5-year-old girl sexually assaulted, bleeds to death

A five-year-old girl, sexually assaulted and tortured for about two months, died early on Saturday morning.

Police have arrested Chandana (45) and her lover Mallikarjun (30), both residents of Talaghattapura in southern Bengaluru, in connection with the case.

The girl was the only daughter of a woman from Kodagu, working in Bengaluru as a domestic help. The woman was widowed a couple of years ago.

With no one at home to take care of the child when she went to work, the woman would leave her daughter with Chandana, a neighbour.

Hungry and afraid

Chandana would deprive the child of food and brutally thrash her for defecating inside the house. She would also threaten her with dire consequences every time she cried out for her mother, police said.

Police said Chandana’s lover Mallikarjun, who frequented her house, had sexually assaulted the girl.

 The ordeal continued until mid-August when the girl started falling ill. Chandana then called up the mother and said she wouldn’t be able to take care of the child any more.

The worried mother took the girl to Rajarajeshwari Hospital on Mysuru Road, and then shifted her to Indira Gandhi Institute of Child Health Hospital in Jayanagar, where her condition remained critical.

Not fed properly for months, the girl had become anaemic and developed ulcers in her stomach which led to bleeding, police said.

Opens up in anguish

The girl was shifted to Vijayashree Hospital in Gottigere, Bannerghatta Road, on August 16.

There, the child mustered courage to tell her mother and the doctors about how she had been sexually assaulted by Mallikarjun at Chandana’s house.

The girl told her mother he had threatened her not to tell anyone about the assault. Doctors at Vijayashree Hospital informed the police about the girl’s plight.

Police rushed to the hospital and took a statement from her. On August 17, they registered a case and arrested Chandana and Mallikarjun, booking them under sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act and the Indian Penal Code. A magistrate remanded them in judicial custody.