Victim's cousin arrested in trainee nun gangrape case in Odisha

Phulbani (Odisha): A woman was held in the trainee nun gangrape case today, taking the total number of arrests to three in the incident which took place at Odisha’s Kandhamal district, police said here. [caption id=“attachment_960031” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Rape protests. AFP[/caption] The arrested woman was identified as Nalini Subhasunder, a cousin of the 28-year-old victim, they said. 32-year-old Nalini was arrested from Mohana in Gajapati district. Police had earlier arrested her cousin brothers - Jatindra, the prime accused, and Jogendra Subhasunder. One accused is still at large, police said. Family rivalry is being suspected as the cause behind the crime. The nun’s family was not in good terms with her father’s elder brother’s family, police said. According to the FIR filed by the victim, who was being trained as a nun at St Mary Convent in Chennai, she had received a call from a woman informing her that her mother was in serious condition. Hearing the news, she rushed to her village. After she alighted from the train at Berhampur railway station in Ganjam district on July 5, she was picked up by her cousins Jatindra and Jogendra, who lived in her village. The woman, who hailed from Minjapanka in Kandhamal district, had no reason to suspect them and accompanied them to her village. But she was taken to unidentified places, including Gajapati district, where the duo along with a third man allegedly raped her for a week before dropping her back at the railway station in Berhampur on July 11 with a threat not to disclose the incident to anyone. The victim told her mother about her ordeal after reaching home last Saturday. Yesterday, Judicial Magistrate Daringbadi Kamalakanta Nayak had rejected bail application of Jatindra and Jogendra and sent them to jail. PTI