In a shocking incident, a woman was allegedly gang-raped by five men in the Neyveli district of Tamil Nadu. The four men have been arrested while the fifth man was beaten to death by the other four as a result of hassle over whose turn it would be next to rape the survivor. The 32-year-old woman is a widow and a mother of three. She was returning from a grocery store with a relative in a two-wheeler when the relative stopped en route to relieve himself.

That is when these five drunk men namely S Karthik (23), M Satish Kumar (23), C Rajadurai (25) and A Sivabalan (22) and the deceased Prakash (26) spotted the woman, went her way and began harassing her. When her relative questioned them and tried to stop them, he was assaulted and chased away. She was then dragged to a secluded spot nearby and brutally gang-raped by all five of them. That is when Prakash was beaten to death by his four friends over taking turns to rape the survivor. They later abandoned the woman and fled the spot.

After gaining consciousness, the woman went to a nearby police station and filed a complaint. Neyveli Thermal Station Inspector S Latha spoke to The News Minute saying, “All four accused have been arrested and sent to prison on Saturday. Two cases of rape and murder have been filed on them. The five who raped the woman were all friends. They are under judicial custody. Their immediate arrest was crucial to ensure that there is a sense of fear over committing such crimes. What can a woman do if a simple act of buying groceries and coming home leads to such a situation?” asks the inspector. “The accused are all daily wage workers.”