Dalit teen domestic help's murder in Chennai: Pocso, SC/ST Act invoked; 4 more held

CHENNAI: In a development in the murder of the Dalit teen domestic help at an apartment in Aminjikarai on Deepavali, the police have arrested four others besides the couple who employed the girl from Thanjavur.

Apart from murder, police have also invoked the sections of the Pocso (Protection of Children from Sexual Offences) Act and the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.

“During investigations, we learned that one of the women accused had violated the girl as a form of punishment attracting POCSO Act,” a senior police officer said.

The police arrested the victim’s employers, Mohammed Nishadh (35), and his wife, Nivetha alias Nasriya (30), on Friday after they found the couple had branded her with a hot iron for ‘slacking’ at work.

The girl, a native of Thanjavur district was employed by the couple to take care of their six-year-old child and do household chores. Mohammed runs a used-car business in the city.

Police investigations revealed that the girl was tortured and abused for the last three months and after one such incident on Deepavali (Thursday), the girl collapsed and died. Nishad and Nasriya along with their domestic help, Mageshwari (40), and friends Lokesh (26), his wife, Jayasakthi (24), and Nishad’s sister, Seema Begum (39), conspired to dump the girl’s body in the apartment bathroom and flee.

The couple with the help of Mohammed’s friend coordinated with a lawyer and approached the police, claiming that the girl fell unconscious and they left in panic. Though the couple claimed that the girl swooned all of a sudden, police who recovered the girl’s body found branding marks and sent her body for an autopsy and are awaiting autopsy results. The girl’s mother is a widow and Mohammed had employed the girl as a house help through his sister, Seema Banu.