The Office of Attorney General (OAG) is still reviewing the case of an alleged rape of a 17-year-old girl by her step-father at Punakha. Punakha police have forwarded the case to OAG in mid-of-October 2021. The police initially have registered the case in the first week of September 2021.
It was learnt that the OAG is in the process of reviewing the case as it has to be proven beyond reasonable doubt. They are in touch with relevant agencies so as to make the case stronger.
The matter came to light when the girl ran away from home to her school where she begged the school to take her into the hostel.
The girl was in a highly traumatized state and she talked to the school counselor about the rape by the step father. This was when the entire matter came to light and the police was informed and the police in turn registered a case.
Apart from the girl’s statement the girl herself told her maternal aunty how the step father had assaulted her right after her mother died in 2019.
The victim had lived with her deceased mother who ran a handicrafts shop near Chimi Lhakhang. They had a one-bedroom apartment with the small shop. She lost her mother in 2019 to liver cancer and since then she was living with her step-father and her 4-year-old half brother.
Before the case even came up there were rumors in the community of the step father raping the girl and the step father even filed a defamation complaint which he later withdrew.
The police could prove that the minor girl is sexually active.
The girl is currently being taken of by a school in Punakha where her biological father is a bus driver.
The step father denied committing the crime. His brother is a traffic policeman in the Punakha police and his sister is a RENEW volunteer from Wangdue, but the step father said nothing works when it comes to the law.
The victims late mother came from a humble background with her siblings working in blue collared jobs. They had questioned why the victim’s statement was not good enough to charge sheet the case to court, how the step father got bail after a night in jail and why the police did not contact the maternal aunties who are closer to the victim.
OAG is in the process of evidence gathering.
Delay in justice is equivalent to no justice. The Delay will just keep traumatizing the victim. Just do it else leave it.