SILCHAR: A 35-year-old woman was arrested at the Guwahati railway station on May 5 (Thursday) for allegedly kidnapping a minor girl of southern Assam’s Karimganj district and trying to sell her for prostitution.
The woman was produced before a court on Friday and sent to judicial custody for 14 days. The minor girl was also rescued from the railway station, police said on Saturday.
Sources in police said the minor girl’s father, who hails from a village under Ratabari Assembly constituency, had informed the local police on May 4 that his 16-year-old daughter had gone missing from their house on that day, following which an investigation was launched.
Police received information that the girl was seen travelling in Kanchenjunga Express headed to Guwahati with a woman, after which the railway police at the Guwahati railway station was contacted and informed about the matter.
The railway police then conducted a search operation on the train after it reached Guwahati, rescued the minor girl and arrested the woman, identified as one Jolly Paul, sources in the police said.
Another source said Jolly kidnapped the girl from her house on May 4 after her father, who is a daily wage earner, went to work. Being a minor, the girl was easily convinced by the woman to go with her after she promised her a lucrative job.
The woman took her to Badarpur railway station and boarded the Kanchenjunga Express for Guwahati. In the meantime, police got the information about the matter and arrested the woman and recovered the minor girl from the train in Guwahati, the source said.
Additional superintendent of police (headquarter), Karimganj, Partha Pratim Das told EastMojo on Saturday that a case (188/2022) under Sections 363 (kidnapping) and 372 (selling minor for purposes of prostitution) of the Indian Penal Code and Section 5 (procuring, inducing or taking a person for the sake of prostitution) of The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, 1956 was registered.
On Friday, the woman was produced before a court in Karimganj and sent to judicial custody for 14 days. The minor girl has been handed over to her family, the additional SP said.
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