A minor girl was gang-raped inside a moving sleeper bus after she accepted a lift during heavy rain in Greater Noida. The bus was supposed to take her to Noida Sector 63 but instead continued toward Delhi, where it eventually abandoned her near Kashmere Gate.
The driver and conductor have been arrested, and the bus has been seized for forensic examination.
Here’s what happened
The girl, a Class 11 student from Uttar Pradesh, had left home to visit her cousin in Noida. Amid heavy rain and darkness, she ended up at Pari Chowk in Greater Noida.
An empty sleeper bus passing through the area stopped after she signalled to the driver.
The driver and conductor allegedly told her they were going towards Noida Sector 63 and offered to drop her there. Believing them, she boarded the bus.
Shortly after the bus began moving, the conductor made obscene gestures towards her. According to her statement to police, the driver and conductor then sexually assaulted her inside the moving bus and threatened to kill her if she resisted.
The sleeper bus had curtains around its berths, which meant that people outside could not easily see what was happening inside.
The bus did not stop at Sector 63
According to the girl’s account, the bus reached Sector 63, but the driver did not stop.
Instead, the vehicle continued towards Delhi and eventually reached the Ring Road near the Kashmere Gate ISBT.
Police said the accused allegedly wanted to abandon the girl farther away from the place where the alleged crime had occurred.
She was eventually dropped near Kashmere Gate ISBT, following which the accused fled.
The girl then took an auto-rickshaw to Kashmere Gate police station and reported the incident.
How police caught the accused
Police formed teams immediately after receiving the complaint.
With the girl’s help, investigators identified the bus and traced it to a parking lot in Timarpur in north Delhi.
The driver, Kuldeep, and conductor, Sandeep, were arrested within hours of the FIR being registered.
The bus was seized and sent for forensic examination. Investigators have also reportedly found strands of the girl’s hair inside the vehicle.
Why was the bus on the road?
The bus was reportedly not operating a regular passenger service at the time.
Police said it had earlier developed a mechanical fault and had been taken to a workshop in Surajpur, Greater Noida, for repairs.
After the repairs, Kuldeep and Sandeep were driving the empty bus back towards Timarpur when they encountered the girl at Pari Chowk.
This is how the vehicle that was supposed to be empty ended up carrying the girl on its journey towards Delhi.
Here’s what was found along the route
The alleged crime has also raised questions about surveillance and police presence along the Greater Noida-Delhi corridor.
A ground assessment of the route found a police booth, a PCR van and heavy barricading near Pari Chowk, close to where the girl allegedly boarded the bus.
Further along the route, the Delhi-Noida border near Mayur Vihar had barricading, but no police personnel were visible during the daytime assessment. The assessment itself noted that it could not establish what the police deployment was on the night of the incident.
At the same intersection, CCTV cameras were reportedly not visible at the traffic signals.
At Kashmere Gate, the reported drop-off point, no visible checkpoint or barricading was found during the ground check.
Across the 43-km stretch examined, only two checkpoints were found.
Police are now retracing the bus’s journey.
Delhi Police investigators are mapping the route taken by the bus to reconstruct its movements.
They are checking CCTV cameras, police checkpoints and barricading along the route and examining available footage to determine whether the bus was captured during its journey.
The surveillance footage could help investigators establish the exact route and timeline of the vehicle.
The sleeper-bus curtains are also under scrutiny
The fact that the bus had curtains around its berths has emerged as an important detail.
According to police, the partitions prevented people outside the bus from seeing what was happening inside.
The issue has also attracted the attention of the National Human Rights Commission.
NHRC member Priyank Kanoongo said the commission had taken cognisance of the case and issued notices to the concerned authorities, seeking information on the child’s rehabilitation, social investigation and care plan.
Kanoongo also said the NHRC had been raising concerns with State authorities about partitions in sleeper-coach buses and the design of driver cabins. He pointed to guidelines issued by the Central Institute of Road Transport (CIRT) and called for strict compliance.
What happened to the girl afterwards?
The girl was produced before the Child Welfare Committee.
As per the Committee’s orders, she was subsequently handed over to her father.
The authorities are also examining her rehabilitation and care as the investigation continues.
What happens next?
The two accused have been arrested, and the bus remains in police custody for forensic examination.
Investigators are now working to corroborate the girl’s account through forensic evidence, CCTV footage and the reconstruction of the bus’s movements.
Police are preparing to file a chargesheet in the case.
The investigation will ultimately seek to establish exactly what happened inside the bus, where the vehicle travelled and what evidence can corroborate the allegations.
