Based on a complaint of gangrape and confinement lodged by two Nepalese women, the Gurgaon Police has registered an FIR against unknown residents of an apartment where the two women were being held.
Since the accused in this case is a Saudi diplomat, police were hard put to arrest him as he enjoys diplomatic immunity under the Vienna Convention. The diplomat was at his office in the Saudi Embassy when the raid on the apartment took place earlier and the women were rescued.
Confirming that the Ministry of External Affairs has sought a detailed report in the matter, police said on Wednesday that the case would be probed as per the Vienna Convention.
Saudi Ambassador to India Saud Mohammed al-Sati has denied any wrongdoing by his diplomat and termed the allegations of sexual assault against him as “false”.
The envoy on Wednesday met MEA officials to protest against the action taken by Haryana police on Tuesday. He complained against “police intrusion” into the house of the diplomat who holds the rank of First Secretary in the embassy, arguing that such an act was against the Vienna Convention.
It is learnt that MEA Joint Secretary Thanglura Darlong conveyed to him that police were unaware of the fact that it was the house of a diplomat and they were acting only on the complaint of gangrape and confinement filed by the women.
“The embassy strongly stresses that these allegations are false and have not been proven,” a statement from the Saudi Embassy said. It further said that the embassy has also brought to the notice of MEA officials the “unwarranted media briefings before completion of investigations” and has protested the “police intrusion into a diplomat’s house against all diplomatic conventions.” The embassy would, however, wait for clarification from the MEA over the matter and the outcome of the investigations into the allegations, it said.
Meanwhile, the Embassy of Nepal in New Delhi too approached the MEA seeking help in the matter. “We are not fully aware of the involvement of any diplomat. When we will be informed, then we will go for it (reach out to the Saudis). It is a very, very sensitive case and we are getting full support from the MEA and local police,” said Nepal Ambassador to India Deep Kumar Upadhyay.
Asked if police have directed the embassy to ensure that the accused diplomat does not leave the country, Gurgaon Police Commissioner Navdeep Singh Virk said all communication will be done through the MEA as per the rules.
He added there is no bar on registration of a case of rape against a foreign diplomat. However, if the investigation requires arrest or there is a need for prosecuting a diplomat, the investigating agency has to take due notice of provisions of the Vienna Convention, 1961, to which India is a signatory.
Meanwhile, based on the statement of one of the victims, police registered an FIR against unnamed persons for gang-rape, unnatural sex, wrongful confinement and criminal intimidation. A medical test of the victims has confirmed sexual assault.
"We have been able to establish the identity (of the diplomat who has been accused of rape) and we have also been able to establish that the residents of that flat enjoy diplomatic immunity," he said.
"In their statements, both to the police and the Judicial Magistrate, the victims did not name the alleged perpetrators. And the law doesn't allow the police to incorporate names into an FIR on its own," said Virk.
The police acted on a complaint received on September 7 from Maiti India, an NGO, at Police Station DlF-II, Gurgaon saying two Nepalese women were being detained in a house in Caitriona Apartment Complex, leela Ambience, Gurgaon.
later, the two women rescued by the police alleged that they were confined and raped by the diplomat and his guests repeatedly.
In their statement, the Nepalese women said the Saudi Arabian family had hired them as housemaids and taken them to Jeddah a few months back to work there. After staying in Jeddah for about a month they were brought to the flat in Gurgaon where they continued working as housemaids.
They alleged that the Saudi Arabian family did not allow them to go out of the house for four to five months, during which time they were beaten up, raped, abused and threatened by the family and their guests.