Delhi Police have registered a case of gang rape after an 18-year-old student at South Asian University (SAU) in South Delhi alleged that she was sexually assaulted by four men inside the university campus on Sunday evening.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (South) Ankit Chauhan confirmed that an FIR has been lodged based on the survivor’s statement. ‘The case is being investigated with due sensitivity and priority,’ the officer said.
Investigators said efforts are underway to identify the four suspects mentioned in the complaint, with multiple teams deployed to trace them.
Harassment Escalates Before Assault
According to the FIR, a copy of which was accessed by Hindustan Times, the BTech first-year student had received a string of threatening emails from an unknown address two to three days before the alleged assault. The messages ordered her to meet near the campus Guest House at 11:27 p.m., but she ignored the demand.
The next day, she received another email filled with obscene language, instructing her to appear outside her hostel block. The student showed these messages to three of her friends, who checked the location at the mentioned time but found no one there. ‘They (the friends) told me to relax and rest because I was stressed,’ she stated in her complaint.
On Sunday, the intimidation took a disturbing turn. The victim received morphed obscene photographs of herself via WhatsApp and Telegram, allegedly created using her profile picture. She also received messages threatening to share the images among students if she did not arrive at Gate Number 3.
‘The message read that if I don’t come to Gate Number 3, these photographs will be circulated among students,’ she wrote in the FIR. When she was unable to reach her friends by phone, she informed another friend but soon stopped responding out of distress.
Allegations Of Assault Near Construction Site
Seeking to avoid crowds, the student took a less-frequented route toward the university’s convocation centre, where construction was underway. There, she sat near a location where a security guard was stationed.
As per her complaint, the guard called over a middle-aged man, after which two younger men joined them. The four allegedly forced her into an empty room near the site and sexually assaulted her. One of the men reportedly tried to force a pill into her mouth, which she managed to spit out.
The attackers fled when they heard noise from people leaving the nearby mess, she said. Disoriented and traumatised, she was later found by her friends near the campus theatre.
Claims Against University Administration
The FIR also includes serious accusations against the university administration. The student said that despite a doctor recognising her condition as serious, the hostel in-charge dismissed her account and allegedly blamed female students instead.
Her friends insisted on police involvement and medical aid, but according to the complaint, the hostel in-charge advised her to ‘take bath and change clothes.’ The student further alleged that officials tried to prevent her from contacting her mother or any outsider and physically blocked her from showing her injuries over a video call.
‘The administration was not taking (me) seriously and not allowing (me) to involve any outsider. I wanted to video call my mother and show her the bruises, but the hostel-in-charge and a guard were covering me,’ she alleged.
Police Investigation And Legal Action
A friend of the victim eventually made a PCR call on Monday afternoon. Responding officers, including a female sub-inspector, found the student too distressed to speak initially. After counselling, she was taken for a medical examination at Madan Mohan Malviya Hospital, where her formal statement was recorded early Tuesday.
Police have registered a case under several sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, including Section 70 (gang rape), Section 62 (attempt to commit offence), Section 123 (causing hurt by means of poison), Section 140(3) (kidnapping), Section 115(2) (voluntarily causing hurt), Section 126(2) (wrongful restraint), and Section 3(5) (common intention).
‘Probe is underway, and teams are working to identify the suspects,’ the DCP said, adding that the survivor’s statement under magistrate recording procedures was completed on Tuesday.