GUWAHATI: A Pocso courtroom in Arunachal Pradesh Thursday sentenced to demise a former hostel warden of a authorities residential college within the state for aggravated sexual assault on 21 youngsters on his watch – 13 women and eight boys within the age group 6-15 – between 2019 and 2022.
Ex-warden Yumken Bagra‘s co-convicts within the case, former headmaster Singtung Yorpen and Hindi trainer Marbom Ngomdir Tapir, had been handed 20-year jail phrases.Two different accused, Daniel Pertin and Tajung Yorpen, had been acquitted.
4 of the survivors had tried suicide after being focused by the warden. Yorpen and Tapir had been convicted and sentenced for failure to report or report a case beneath Pocso Act. The youngsters purportedly suffered sexual abuse in silence till a pair of sisters confided to their dad and mom in Nov 2022 about being assaulted by Bagra. An FIR was lodged at a police station in Shi-Yomi district, resulting in Bagra’s arrest.
When a district courtroom accepted the ex-warden’s plea for bail in July final yr, Gauhati HC took suo motu cognisance and quashed the order. He has been in custody since. The opposite two convicts, Yorpen and Tapir, had been arrested after Thursday’s verdict. Whereas cancelling Bagra’s bail, HC cited particulars of the crime within the chargesheet to ascertain why it was essential to preserve him in custody until the completion of the trial.
“A perusal of the chargesheet, which incorporates transient references to the statements of the victims, displays that the accused warden pressured the youngsters staying as boarders within the hostel to observe pornographic motion pictures and repeatedly subjected them to sexual assault.”
“Medical studies of most victims corroborates the truth that they had been sexually assaulted,” courtroom mentioned. The Pocso courtroom’s judgment will likely be despatched to Gauhati HC for affirmation.
