15-year-old sends police on hunt with false rape claim

A 15-year-old girl sent the Bhiwandi police on a wild goose chase after filing a false complaint of kidnap and gang rape, police said on Friday.

Following the complaint on November 18, the Shanti Nagar police of Maharashtra's Bhiwandi town registered an offence against unidentified persons under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, an official said.

The minor had alleged that when she was on her way to school on November 14, four men kidnapped her, took her to Asangaon in Thane district and raped her, he said.

As the matter seemed serious, senior police officials got involved in the case, the official said, adding that in the course of the investigation, the police found several loopholes in the teen's narrative, the official said.

When they could not find anything on the CCTV footage collected from Kalyan, Asangaon and Vasind railway stations, the police called in the minor's parents and advocates to prove that there are loopholes in the story, he added.

After being confronted about the contradictions in her version of events, the teen confessed that she had made the whole thing up, as she had left home after a quarrel with her parents and had to lie about her whereabouts to avoid being scolded for running away, Thane police spokesperson Sukhada Narkar said.