The Madhya Pradesh are probing allegations that at least seven tribal girls in Sidhi district were lured and raped by a 30-year-old man, who used a voice-changing app to pose as a woman college professor offering them scholarships.
“We have arrested the accused, Brajesh Prajapati, and two other men, who assisted him by providing the phone number of the first victim. The accused used a voice-changing application that is available on the app store and used that to change his voice to a female college professor to target these women. All the victims are from the tribal community and belong to financially weak families,” Sidhi Superintendent of Police Ravindra Verma told The Indian Express.
The police have said that four women have come forward so far, and the accused has confessed to raping three others. “In one case, the accused raped a woman and her minor sister by luring them into a forested region. The POCSO Act has also been invoked against him,” Verma said.
The police have sought Prajapati’s remand after his remand expired on Friday.
As per the police, the accused is a labourer who learnt how to use the application on YouTube. He procured the phone number of the first victim with the help of the co-accused, Rahul Prajapati and Sandeep Prajapati, police said.
“He called that woman to an isolated spot promising to provide her scholarship money. Posing as a female college professor, he told the woman that her son would meet her and escort her to their home, where the scholarship would be disbursed. The accused then took the victim to an isolated spot in a forested area, where he raped her at an abandoned jhopri belonging to his family,” Verma said.
Police said he would also rob the women’s phones and threaten them with dire consequences. The accused would look for contacts of other women on their phones. “He would randomly call phone numbers and speak to women 10-20 times a day. He would offer scholarships, and in case they were not going to college, he would offer government schemes to lure them to the forest,” the officer said.
The police have claimed that the incidents have been taking place since January, and the police took action after two survivors approached them. “In one case, a survivor managed to flee while she was being taken on his bike. At the same time, the first survivor also contacted us. After arresting the accused, we analysed his call detail records and looked at the phone numbers which he called repeatedly, which helped us trace the other victims,” the officer said.
