Panchkula, November 25
The police today arrested two Army personnel accused of raping a patient at the Command Hospital, Chandimandir. Naik Hottam Singh and Naik Iftikhar Khan, belonging to the Army Medical Corp, were produced before the civil judge-cum-judicial magistrate and sent to police custody for two days.
The third accused, Raja, who allegedly filmed the incident has not been traced so far. “We arrested the two after the Army authorities handed them over to us. We will interrogate them and take some more samples before producing them in court on Thursday,” Sandip Khirwar, SP, said.
The 39-year-old victim on Sunday had complained to the police that Naik Hottam Singh, documentation in charge in the neuro-surgical ward, with the connivance of Naik Iftikhar Khan, a nursing attendant, raped her in the dining hall on Saturday afternoon.
She alleged that another person filmed the rape. They threatened her that if she told anyone about the incident, they would circulate the film.
Hottam is in his mid-30s and belongs to Madhya Pradesh while Khan is around 40 years old and hails from Bihar.
The police said the victim reached the hospital around 12 noon for physiotherapy. Later, she went to meet a relative who was admitted there and decided to meet an official to get a medical certificate which was required to retain her government accommodation. She asked Hottam for directions and he took her to the dining hall and allegedly raped her.
The police, however, is yet to establish that the incident was filmed as the victim did not see anybody else there other than the accused. Hottam had told her that the rape had been videographed, the police said.
An Army spokesman said an internal court of inquiry had been ordered and if the accused were found guilty, disciplinary action would be taken against them