8 held for abducting, ragging engg students

8 held for abducting, ragging engg students
The city police on Monday arrested eight youths for allegedly kidnapping and ragging two first-year students of an engineering college. Prakash Singh, 17, has alleged in his complaint to Nandanvan police that he along with his co-student Abhijeet Maran, 19, was forcibly taken by college seniors to various locations and ragged for hours. Police said that after being kidnapped, the two boys were forced to strip and subjected to physical humiliation and abuse.

Whenever they refused to comply, they were beaten up. This incident is one of the ugliest ragging cases that have come to light in the last couple of years. Prakash is a student at Bhagwati Chaturvedi College of Engineering (BCE) where some of the accused also study. Of the eight accused, Pushpajeet Ranjan, Manish Singh, Ranjan Chanchal, Vishnu Singh and Prince Kumar Rai are students of BCE. Apart from Maharashtra Prohibition of Ragging Act, the accused have also been booked under the various sections of the IPC. These include section 143 (unlawful assembly), 147 (rioting), 149 (unlawful group committing offence against common object), 352 (assault), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 294 (obscene acts), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 363 (kidnapping).

Police said the accused took away victims from their residence on Monday. A third student was let off as he pleaded that it was time for his afternoon prayers. This student then informed the victims' local guardian, Chandan Prasad.

Speaking to TOI, Prasad, said, "I was informed of the destination in Chitnis Nagar where Prakash was being held. I reached there from my residence in Hingna by 4pm. I then convinced the seniors to release the boys and dropped them back to their residence."

(Names of victims have been changed to protect identity)