It was a tip of iceberg of living hell for children, when five minor girls were found roaming around in Bhopal’s Ratibad area in a drunken and disoriented state by a police patrolling team around 3 am in the wee hours of 12 July. After police brought the girls, at the Ratibarh police station, a 68-year-old man Pyare Miyan visited the police station introducing himself as their grandfather to claim the girls. But, when police insisted on seeing the girls’ parents, Pyare Miyan tried to bribe the inspector, but retreated, since police didn’t budge from their stated position to see the girls’ parents. After police called the child helpline to question the girls, the girls told the police that Pyare Miya had invited them to a birthday party on the night of 11 July in a flat under the Shahpura police station area of the city. When the girls composed themselves, one of them told the police that they were raped by Pyare Miya the last night. The remaining four victims also informed the police that they had also been raped in the same flat by the accused on earlier occasions, as police informed.
Meanwhile, Pyare Miyan, who is the owner of Urdu daily, Afkar, from Bhopal, abandoned his Pajero at Ashta, located between Bhopal and Indore, and went into hiding. Five minor girls and a woman filed FIR of rape against the journalist, Pyare Miyan so far. On 14 July, when police raided his flat in posh Shyamla hills area Bhopal, they were struck by its interiors, which resembled like a ‘dance bar’ with expensive liquor bottles. What police further sized during raids was child pornographic CDs, high-end cars, and bones of wild animals. It was no less than living hell for the girls who said they were at the same place.
Was Pyare Miyan the part of international Child sex racket, as the police further revealed that Pyare Miyan had travelled to the UK, Switzerland and Thailand with minors girls in the last few years? The apparent reason for his foreign visits was covered up as business related travel, also. Creator of living hell for minors, Pyare Miyan is the heavy weight business man as he deals in property to running a newspaper from a government property. He owns several properties in posh area of Bhopal and Indore.
After the Bhopal police on 14 July, set up a special investigation team (SIT) in inquire into cases, Pyare Miyan, the accused of operating a sex racket, has been arrested from Srinagar, J&K by local police on 15 July. Modus operandi of Pyare Miyan was to lure girls, who lived at a slum resettlement colony in Bhopal for working as domestic help. His personal assistant for four years, 21 years old, Sweety Vishwakarma allegedly brought the minor girls to parties and paid them on Pyare Miyan’s behalf. Sweety Vishwakarma was also arrested with Pyare Miyan’s driver, one of his associates and the grandmother of one of the victims, who was an alleged accomplice.
Child rights body National Commission for Protection of Child Rights(NCPCR) told that Pyare Miyan would take the minors to his different properties, including those in Indore, on the pretext of cleaning them. 55-year-old grandmother’s presence ensured that people did not doubt Pyare Miyan. Activists for child right, who counseled the victims, said some are so young that they did not even realise that they were being exploited.
The case has been registered under Sections 366A [Procuration of minor girl], 376(2)(n) [commits rape repeatedly on the same person] and 120B [Punishment of criminal conspiracy] of the Indian Penal Code and 5/6 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. According to police, Sections of Excise Act and the Wildlife Act were also added against Pyare Miyan following seizure of bones of wild animals. Sections of SC/ST Act have also been invoked as two of the minor girls belonged to these communities”
Bhopal administration on 15 July, razed a marriage hall and an apartment illegally owned by Pyare Miyan on government land, however it must be investigated if the accused got political favour to run this heinous child sex racket. What is inhumanly appalling that girls, who were freed from the clutches of Pyare Mohan, called him Abba (means father) and they were very dirty.
