Criminals find easy targets in slums and illegal colonies of Gurugram

Gurugram: Legs broken, head crushed with bricks, 10 centimeters of stick inserted into the private part. The recent rape and brutal death of a three-year-old may have caused a shiver to most of the residents of the national capital region following this news report. For most of the residents of Gurugram living in slums, this is however just one more proof that highlights the vulnerabilities faced by them by the criminals who find their easy targets in these areas.

For a city where already over 135 cases of minor rapes have been reported, the shanties are an easy target for predators. According to law enforcement officials, two out of five rape cases of minors occur in the slums and illegal colonies. "We have identified certain sensitive areas in the city and deployed our officials over there in plain clothes to maintain surveillance. We are also in the process of streamlining the video coverage captured in CCTV cameras so that we can catch the culprits quickly," added the official.

"I would urge that generalisations should not be formed in such cases as is being done by most of the citizens. To say Gurugram is unsafe because of such cases will be unfair to the city and its residents," said a senior police official who is in charge of handling cases of sexual crimes in the city

The official also mentioned that all those rapists earlier held have not been mentally unstable or juveniles and realise the enormity of crimes they commit. Like Sunil, the accused in the rape and murder of three-year-old, most of the culprits are able to flee from the city and therefore escape from the clutches of the police. "There are several categories of rapists. In our interrogation, one person raped an infant as he was unemployed and was advised that upon committing this act he may get a job. There was another case where a person was impotent and he committed this crime just to vent out his anger, said the senior official.

It is not only rape but these areas have also become a favourable spot for the supply of drugs and even extortion. There have been cases where the residents in the city claim that how psychotropic drugs are being supplied to the youth in the Millennium City.