A SIX-MONTH pregnant woman, a Dalit, had to undergo abortion, hours after she was allegedly beaten up by a man for defecating in his field at Devmanpur village of Kanpur district’s Ghatampur area. While the incident took place on Wednesday, the police arrested the accused, Awadh Naresh Sachan, on Friday. The postmortem of the foetus was conducted on Saturday.

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According to the complaint filed by the victim’s husband, Jaichand, Rampyari (32) had gone to relieve herself in the field on December 21 when Sachan caught her. “It was 6 am. Awadh Naresh dragged my wife by her hair and beat her up mercilessly… she kept pleading that she was pregnant. He even forced her to clean the feces,” alleged Jaichand.

Rampyari, who complained of severe stomach ache after she was assaulted, aborted the same night at her house. Jaichand said police refused to lodge his complaint. “They asked me to leave,” he claimed, adding that he kept the foetus in the house till the police lodged an FIR the next day.

“Aaj bacche ko dafna ke aaya hoon. Biwi ko haspatal walo ne admit karne se mana kar diya. Usey private me admit karayenge (Have buried my child today. Will admit my wife in a private hospital as the government district hospital has refused to take her in),” said Jaichand, a daily wage labourer and the father of five .

Ghatampur SHO Anil Kumar denied that there was any delay in lodging the FIR. “The accused was arrested on Friday and produced before court, which sent him to jail on Saturday,” he said.

An FIR has been registered under relevant IPC sections and SC/ST (prevention of atrocities) Act, police said. “We have got the woman medically examined. The doctors said she is stable,” Kumar said.

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