Kathua rape case: Accused to be produced before Pathankot court

A police team along with the staff of Kathua court and sessions judge will present all the files to Pathankot court and request permission to translate all the documents from Urdu to English.

The public prosecutor will also move a plea to keep accused in judicial custody in Pathankot citing security concerns in transporting them to court, the officials said.

After several petitions in SC and J&K high court, the case is finally set to move to the trial stage with an in-camera hearing.

The sessions judge of Pathankot has himself take up the trial and agreed to hear on a day-to-day basis.

The Crime Branch had submitted a charge sheet in the crime on April 9 before the Kathua court.

The case came into the national limelight after lawyers of the Kathua bar association tried to prevent the police from filing the documents.

According to the charge-sheet, the eight-year-old girl, who was kidnapped on January 10 this year, was allegedly raped in captivity in a small village temple in Kathua after having been kept sedated for four days before she was bludgeoned to death.

The FIR named eight people, including temple custodian and alleged mastermind Sanji Ram, his son Vishal, a juvenile nephew, and special police officers Deepak Khajuria alias "Deepu" and Surender Verma.

The others arrested are the juvenile's friend Parvesh Kumar as well as investigating officers head constable Tilak Raj and sub-inspector Anand Dutta, who allegedly took Rs. 4 lakh from Ram and destroyed crucial evidence.