Headmaster, deputy held for gang-rape

Agence France Presse

New Delhi, February 18:

Police in the Indian capital have arrested a school headmaster, a vice-principal and two of their friends on charges of gang-raping a 16-year-old student, a police spokesman said today. The alleged rapists, aged between 38 and 58 years, lured the tenth grade girl to a private bungalow on the pretext of giving her a school-graduating certificate and then assaulted her, he said.

Police said the 58-year-old headmaster of a state-run city school was suspected of being the mastermind of the attack. He had gained the teenager’s confidence by helping her with her studies over the past few months. The second suspect is the 52-year-old vice-principal of another government school. The spokesman did not identify the other two suspects, who have also been arrested. If convicted the four men could face 10 years in jail and a large fine. With more than 320 sexual assaults in 2004, New Delhi has earned the dubious title of being India’s ‘rape capital.’