Driving Naari Programme launched in Chandigarh
Ludhiana: Police have arrested a 23-year-old married man of Manakwal village in Ludhiana for raping two women within the last month. The accused, Balwinder Singh alias Kaku alias Manu, impersonated police officers and targeted women he spotted with male friends in the city’s famous, Rakh Bagh Park, under the guise of moral policing.
Balwinder, who is unemployed, told his victims that senior police officers had deputed him in the park in civvies to keep a tab on ‘unmarried couples creating nuisance’.
He would ensure the man went away, but took the woman with him, claiming to be taking her to the police station to register a case. He would then take the woman to an isolated spot and rape her.
This sexual hunting would have continued unabated had his latest victim, a 25-year-old woman from Rakh Bagh, who had come to meet her boyfriend on Friday (February 2), not noted down the registration number of the Bullet motorcycle that Balwinder used to kidnap her. Here too, Balwinder had threatened the victim’s boyfriend, forcing him to leave.
This woman was raped at an isolated spot in Jassal village, around 7km from the Rakh Bagh Park.
The woman lodged a complaint at the Division Number 8 police station. Balwinder was booked under sections 376 (rape), 365 (kidnapping or abducting with intent to confine person) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code.
Additional deputy commissioner of police (ADCP, City 3) Gurpreet Kaur Purewal said, “The victim’s presence of mind in noting down the registration number of the accused’s motorcycle helped us trace him.”
Balwinder is also accused of kidnapping and raping a 27-year-old woman from the Rakh Bagh Park on December 30.
In her complaint, this woman had said, “This man asked me and my male friend on why were we sitting together. He asked us our religion and told us he was a policeman and we could not sit there. He threatened to call our families and even lodge a case. My male friend was made to leave.”
The accused then took her to a house in the Gill Chowk area, again on a Bullet motorcycle, and raped her, she alleged. “It is possible that the accused could have raped more women. They might not have filed a complaint,” ADCP Purewal added.
