12-Year-Old Raped by 30 Men
In a horrifying incident, a 12-year-old was repeatedly raped for two years in malappuram district of Kerala.
Kerala's Malappuram District, a 12-year-old girl lived with her mother, father and a sick grandmother. The family was very poor and desperately needed money. The girl’s father was unemployed and had forced her mother into prostitution. He then started to take money from his friends and allowed them to rape his daughter. For the last 2 years, more than 30 people raped the girl. People living near them knew that something wrong was going on in the house but they used to ignore it. A neighboring woman said that she used to hear a girl crying in the night and saw men going inside the house. Some said that they did not want to interfere in family matters and wanted to protect their daughters. No one tried to help the girl.
A classmate of the girl said that she would sit alone in school and never talk. Her mother would come to drop and pick her. One of the neighbors complained to school authorities that something was wrong in the house. After this the school sent her for counselling sessions where she spoke about her rape. The counselor said that the girl did not even recognize that she was being abused. When told the truth she started crying because if they arrested her father who would earn money for her family and they would not be able to pay rent. The Police have now arrested the father and two other people under the POCSO Act. Malappuram has the highest number of sexual abuse cases in Kerala. The police are now investigating if any other poor families are forcing their daughters into prostitution.
