13-year-old gang-rape victim again tries suicide

New Delhi, April 29 (IANS) A 13-year-old victim of gang-rape, who was recuperating in hospital here after consuming an overdose of sleeping pills April 20, yet again tried to commit suicide late Sunday night at the hospital, her relatives said.

The girl was brought to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) from Hedgewar Hospital April 22, after she had taken an overdose of sleeping pills following her gang-rape during nine days of captivity by her attackers.

"She took 16 sleeping pills last night around 2 (a.m.). She called our mother and told her that she was going to die, and then she fell unconscious," the girl's sister told IANS.

The girl, who was abducted March 15 by eight men, including some known to her, and released from her ordeal March 24, had earlier consumed an overdose of sleeping pills in the morning of April 20 at her house in Farsh Bazar area in east Delhi.

Of the eight accused, seven have been so far been arrested.

The 13-year-old victim and her 12-year-old brother were abducted by two men known to her on March 15 from outside her house and taken to Loni on the city's outskirts. There, six more men joined the two men who took the siblings to another house and raped the girl, a police officer said.

The boy was released the next day. The girl was kept captive for nine days.