A 12-year-old girl walked 8 kilometres door to door for help after being raped, bleeding and half naked in Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh India, as per security footage received by the police from the suburb.
In response to claims that locals in Ujjain refused to assist the 15-year-old, Ujjain police head Sachin Sharma disagreed, claiming they gave her money instead.
"There were mixed responses. People in the localities she passed through had helped her. Some gave her ₹ 50, others gave ₹ 100. She crossed a toll booth on the way. The staff there gave her money and some clothes. At least 7-8 people tried to help," the officer told NDTV.
After the incident, the young girl was left half-naked, and CCTV footage shows a man shooing her away.
At an ashram, where a priest offered her his clothes and dialled the police, she eventually received assistance. She was taken to the hospital in a hurry after the police arrived twenty minutes later.
Activist Yogita Bhayana, who has worked with several rape survivors, told the BBC that she was trying to trace the girl's family and get in touch with them to offer support.
On the visuals of the man turning away the teen, the senior police officer said, "We traced the video and questioned people in that area. When we found her, she had 120 rupees that people from the locality had given her."
The girl had quite critical injuries, but her condition is now stable. So far, there have been no arrests in this case.
She hails from a district in Madhya Pradesh that is almost 700 kilometres away from Ujjain, according to the police.
Along with her grandfather and older brother, she resides there.
She departed for school on Sunday but never came back.
Additionally, her family members had reported her missing.
The event has drawn attention once more to Madhya Pradesh's appalling track record when it comes to crimes of male violence against women.
The National Crime Records Bureau states that Madhya Pradesh has the highest number of reported rapes in the nation in 2021. More than half of these crimes involved girl children.
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