BSF personnel arrested on rape charges remanded to 7-day judicial custody

Two Border Security Force (BSF) personnel arrested on charges of rape at Indo-Bangladesh border areas in West Bengal's North 24 Parganas district, were remanded to seven days' police custody by a district court on Saturday afternoon.

Meanwhile, a spokesman for the BSF's Eastern Command office in Kolkata said that both the accused personnel -- assistant sub-inspector S.P. Chero and constable Altaf Hossain, who were arrested on Friday night, were suspended from the forces with immediate effect.

Preliminary investigation has revealed the 23-year-old victim was trying to cross the border along with her child in Bagda when she was chased and nabbed by the accused BSF personnel. However, instead of arresting them and handing them over to the local police, the two accused dragged her to a nearby gourd cultivation field and raped her.

Local MLA from Bagda Biswajit Das, who got elected as a BJP candidate in the 2021 West Bengal assembly election and later moved to ruling Trinamool Congress camp, said that harassment of the common people at the border nearing villages in the area by the BSF personnel posted there are quite common. "I receive frequent complaints of harassment from the local villagers. I will give a detailed report to our chief minister, Mamata Banerjee and on Sunday we will be organising a protest rally in the area," he said.