After throwing her off the bus, accused tried to crush 'Amanat', say sources

First they brutally beat and gang-raped
the 23-year-old medical student in a
moving bus. Then, they threw her and her
friend, also badly beaten, out of the bus.
And then, the six men accused of
murdering the young woman in a case
that has shaken a nation's conscience,
allegedly tried to drive the bus over the
couple.
The friend pulled her to safety, just in
time, police sources say. This is one of
many shocking details now emerging of
what happened on the evening of Sunday,
December 16, as the Delhi Police puts
together a 1000-page chargesheet which
it plans to submit in a Delhi court on
Thursday.
The sources said the police chargesheet is
likely to give details of the horrific
brutality of the six men and the valiant
attempt of the young woman and her
friend, hopelessly outnumbered, to fight
them off. In that effort, as she was
pinned down and raped, the young
woman bit three of the men assaulting
her. The bite marks on the three accused
men are likely to be part of the Delhi
Police's evidence, the sources say.
The woman died on Saturday last after a
13-day struggle to survive injuries so
grievous that her intestines had to be
removed and she had three major
surgeries and a cardiac arrest before being
flown to Singapore. She died in hospital
there of severe organ failure. The Mount
Elizabeth Hospital where she died is
expected to send its post mortem report
to the Delhi Police soon. It will be one of
the most crucial pieces of evidence in the
case that the police is building against the
six accused.
Key testimony also lies in the statement
of the software engineer who was
accompanying Amanat (NOT her real
name) on the bus and was assaulted with
an iron rod by the six drunk men on
board when he tried to protect her.
According to the police, when the woman
and her male friend boarded the private
bus at the Munirka bus-stop in south
Delhi, they saw some men sitting inside,
who seemed to be passengers. The
unsuspecting couple, the police sources
say, did not know realise that all these
men were, in fact, part of a group. A little
later, as the bus moved, the men came
together and confronted the woman for
being out late with a man. A scuffle
began and the woman's friend reportedly
hit out at one of the accused; his friends
pulled out an iron rod and began to beat
up first the man and then the woman
too, because she put up a fight.
Sources say the police has found out that
the girl was taken to the back of the bus
and held down by two of the accused, a
man named Akshay Thakur and another
who is a minor and cannot be named. As
she fought the men, the woman bit
Akshay, the main accused Ram Singh, and
another man accused, Vinay Sharma.
Forensic tests will establish who bit them,
say police sources.
One of the charges against Ram Singh,
the driver of the bus, is destruction of
evidence; he allegedly washed down the
bus to erase all proof of the crime and
also burnt the clothes that the men had
snatched off the victims before throwing
them on the road.
The police have added dacoity to the list
of charges against the six men; they have
already been charged with murder,
attempt to murder, gang-rape, sodomy,
kidnapping and robbery. The first draft of
the chargesheet, sources say, cites
around 30 to 40 witnesses, including the
doctors who treated the student, first in
Delhi, and then at the Singapore hospital.
While in critical condition in hospital,
Amanat shared her testimony with two
different judges. Her account was not
video-taped, but will be the most
important evidence in the trial. Daily
hearings have been promised by the
Delhi High Court and the government, to
ensure that a verdict is reached quickly.
Senior police sources say that the
chargesheet has been vetted by legal
experts, and that the police will ask for
the death penalty for the six men who
have been charged with Amanat's rape
and murder. The minor cannot be tried in
court. A report will be sent to the
Juvenile Justice Board, which will handle
his case.
The unabated monstrosity of the attack
on Amanat has walloped India, stirring
anger and protests, with thousands
pledging to fight in her memory for better
safety for women and tougher laws for
those convicted of rape. Activists also
point out the need for fast-track trials for
rape cases to counter the perception that
the notoriously slow legal system allows
those accused of sexual and other crimes
to escape punishment.