Year-ender 2023: Ujjain minor girl was raped, disturbing visuals shocked country

The conscience of the nation was shaken after a girl was brutally raped in Ujjain. The Madhya Pradesh Police registered a case in this regard against the accused auto-driver. ETV Bharat's Irshad Khan revisits this horrendous incident, which took place in Madhya Pradesh.

Hyderabad: In a year that saw the ruling BJP government retain power on the back of a woman-friendly scheme in Madhya Pradesh, the Hindi state ironically recorded the most number of crimes against children in a year. At the center of the brutality against children was the horrific incident of 25 September this year, which shook the nation to the spine - the chilling CCTV footage showing a girl walking semi-nude and bleeding on the street.

A 12-year-old Dalit girl, later identified to be a resident of Satna district, was found unconscious outside an ashram in Ujjain district of Madhya Pradesh. The girl was found unconscious in a semi-nude condition and bleeding from her wounds after being allegedly raped on Badnagar Road under the Mahakal police station limits of Ujjain city.

Horrendous CCTV footage emerges:

The CCTV footage showed the girl walking on the road amid indifference by locals. What made the horrific and brutal sexual assault case all the more heart-wrenching, was that the girl was seen going door to door in search of help, but was shooed away before she fell unconscious outside the ashram.

A priest named Rahul Sharma, administrator at the Dandi Ashram helped to shift her to a local hospital even as police started a probe into the case. In the subsequent investigation by the Madhya Pradesh Police Special Investigation Team, a First Information Report (FIR) was registered at the Mahakal Police Station under relevant sections of law including 376 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and relevant sections of the POCSO Act.

The Ujjain Police arrested the accused auto driver for raping the girl and later dropping her near the Mahakal temple. It was later revealed that a day before her rape, the girl had a tiff with her grandfather back home in Satna and had fled to Ujjain via train. The accused auto driver found her outside the Ujjain railway station and raped her on the pretext of helping her.

Shocking apathy by locals:

Apart from the sexual assault of the girl, what was appalling was the chilling apathy of the locals in Ujjain to the girl's condition. According to the police, the CCTV footage of the different areas of Ujjain where the girl was seen walking in a bleeding condition suggested that she walked around eight km on foot seeking help, but was turned away at each spot. The girl was seen in the CCTV footage seeking help from a man at one point and a woman at another but to no avail. Both had however justified themselves saying they "did not understand the language" of the girl.

Caste-based discrimination:

The horrific sexual assault of the girl also highlighted the caste-based discrimination in Madhya Pradesh with the latest annual report of the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) revealing that the state recorded the maximum number of cases of crime against children. According to the NCRB report, Madhya Pradesh recorded as many as 20,415 cases of crime against children in 2022. Moreover, crime against Dalits in Madhya Pradesh is higher than the national average as per data.

Political row erupts:

The shocking case of sexual assault led to a political row with the opposition Congress attacking the ruling BJP both in the state and the Centre. Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge had said Prime Minister Narendra Modi was "travelling from place to place showing the dream of women's reservation and trying to garner applause". "The reality is that a very painful incident of brutality has come to light against a 12-year-old minor from BJP-ruled Madhya Pradesh,” Kharge posted on X shortly after the incident came to light.

Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi also condemned the horrific crime saying it was “an assault on the soul of Bharat Mata”. "There is no justice, no law and order, and no rights – today, the entire country is ashamed of the condition of the daughters of Madhya Pradesh. But the Chief Minister of the state and the Prime Minister of the country have no shame at all - they have suppressed the screams of their daughters amidst election speeches, hollow promises, and false slogans,” Rahul Gandhi, a former Congress chief had said.

Barring the uproar it led to, the horrific Ujjain rape case failed to dent BJP's prospects in the Assembly polls which were held on November 17. BJP retained power by braving an anti-incumbency wave ironically on the back of former Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan's flagship 'MP Mukhya Mantri Ladli Behna' scheme. The BJP registered a landslide victory in the Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections winning 163 of the 230 seats. Congress, which sought to corner the saffron party over the Ujjain rape case, was a distant second winning 66 seats.