A minor girl was allegedly raped by a 20-year-old man, who was her senior judo player, inside his car in T P Nagar area in Meerut city in Uttar Pradesh on Friday.

The car of the accused had a flag of the ruling BJP besides having a “BJP Goraksha Samiti” sticker.

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The accused, Pulkit Saini, has been arrested following a complaint of the victim girl’s father and a case of rape has been registered against him in the T P Nagar police station.

According to police, the victim girl, 15, was on her way to the college on her scooty for her judo practice on Friday evening. Pulkit, who was her senior, stopped her near a shopping complex. They used to practise judo together on the ground of a local college. He asked the girl to park her scooty at the complex on the pretext that they could go together in his car from there.

The girl fell into Pulkit’s trap and agreed to go with him, police said. But instead of going to the college, he drove the car to some secluded place and allegedly raped her inside his car. He also threatened her of dire consequences if she dared to tell anyone about the incident.

The traumatised girl told her parents about the horrific incident when she reached home on Friday night. Her family was in a state of shock and was initially indecisive about their response. But when the girl’s condition deteriorated on Saturday night, she was admitted to a hospital by her family members.

A complaint was then lodged with the police against Pulkit, which led to his arrest.

Dinesh Kumar, SHO of T P Nagar police station, said: “On the basis of the FIR lodged by the father of victim girl, a minor, police have arrested accused Pulkit Saini late on Saturday night.”

A team of forensic experts also visited the spot and collected evidence from there,including Pulkit’s car where the alleged rape occurred, the SHO said.

There was a BJP flag and a sticker of the ruling party’s Goraksha Samiti on the car of the accused. Sources said that Pulkit was “actively involved in activities related to Goraksha (cow protection)”.

The BJP’s Meerut city president, Mukesh Singhal, however, claimed that “Pulkit has nothing to do with the BJP”. He claimed that the rape accused was using the BJP flag and a sticker of its Goraksha Samiti “fraudulently”.

Several incidents of heinous crimes and horrific atrocities against girls and women have been reported from various parts of Uttar Pradesh in recent days, including from Hathras where a 19-year-old Dalit girl was gang-raped and brutalised allegedly by four upper-caste men that led to her death.