June 29, 2021: In yet another heinous crime against women, a 16-year-old girl was raped in Satgaon’s Nawapara area of Guwahati on Monday, June 28.

The 21-year-old accused, Aminul Hoque hails from Nawapara’s Milijuli path area in Satgaon. According to reports, the accused dragged the girl forcefully to his room from the lavatory at night around 12AM after which he raped her.

The mother of the victim later filed a complaint against the accused in Satgaon Police Station and police has arrested Hoque today under the POCSO Act 2012.

The victim is undergoing treatment at a hospital.

On June 25, a 9-year-old girl from Tamulpur in Baksa district was raped by a 44-year-old man when she along with her brother had gone fishing in a pond. The man was arrested by police under the POCSO Act after the girl’s family filed a complaint against him.

This rape incident is among the series of such crimes against girls that has been reported over the past few days from different parts of Assam.

On June 20, another 9-year-old girl, from Balidunga village in Morigaon was found dead in a jute field near the Brahmaputra River after being raped and murdered by a 66-year-old cleric. The accused was arrested on June 27 by the Morigaon police.

Earlier this month, two minor girls, aged 14 and 16, were found hanging from a tree in a village under the Kokrajhar police station on June 11. Police had arrested seven people for their involvement in the rape and murder of the two teenage tribal girls in Assam’s Kokrajhar district.

There has been a marked increase in three categories of crime against women in Assam, according to National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data.

The number of rape cases stood at 1736 in 2020, whereas the number of molestation cases was reported at 3820, kidnapping of women/girls 4920, cruelty by husband 11,389, trafficking 53 and dowry death at 124.