New Delhi:
While the nation still finds it hard to get over the Muzaffarpur shelter home case, a renewed surge of horror rattled the country yet again on Monday. According to a 73-page charge sheet filed by the CBI in connection with the massive sex scandal in Muzaffarpur, minor girls residing in the shelter home were forced to have sex with the owner and others, and dance on ‘vulgar’ songs. The charge-sheet was filed against Brajesh Thakur, the prime accused and the owner of the state-run shelter home in Bihar. Apart from Brajesh, other accused in the case include the staff of the Balika Grih and several influential politicians and bureaucrats.
Elaborating further, the investigation agency said, the teenage girls were forced to wear revealing clothes, dance to "Bhojpuri songs", drugged, made to lie down and raped by the "guests" of Thakur. Girls who resisted were beaten and tortured, it added.
Thakur, who has been charged with serious crimes under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act or POCSO Act, is considered to be "a very influential man" and was shifted to a jail outside Bihar in order to prevent any obstruction to the probe. Earlier, he was seen sharing the dais with several political leaders from the ruling Janata Dal-United (JD-U) government in the state.
The sexual exploitation of nearly three dozen minor girls in the government-run shelter home came to light through a social audit report by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences or TISS in July 2018. Muzaffarpur shelter home case refers to the alleged sexual exploitation of over 30 minor girls, aged among seven to 14 years residing at the Balika Grih of Muzaffarpur, Bihar.
Read | Muzaffarpur shelter home case: Tortured for being woman, belonging to Kushwaha community: Manju Verma
In November 2018, Manju Verma was forced to step down as the Bihar social welfare minister under relentless pressure to take moral responsibility for her husband Chandrasekhar Verma's alleged links with Thakur. Verma and her husband were evading arrest following the recovery of a huge cache of arms ammunition from their Patna residence. The Arms Act case cropped up in course of a CBI probe into the Muzaffarpur shelter home sex scandal.
