A 48-year-old woman was assaulted and robbed of jewellery in West Tambaram on Tuesday night.
Latha (48) is a resident of Gandhi Nagar First Main Road in Old Perungalathur. Her husband Madhav Raj is a lecturer in a private educational institution in Puducherry. As she was unwell, she had come to Tambaram on Tuesday morning and had undergone a scan at a private hospital. She returned in the evening to collect the reports and was waiting at the West Tambaram Tank bus stop when the driver of an autorickshaw approached her. She informed him that she was waiting for a share autorickshaw.
However, the autorickshaw driver told her that he would drop her at Old Perungalathur for Rs.10. She got inside and the autorickshaw had barely travelled some distance when the driver took two more youth as passengers.
Instead of travelling straight on Mudichur Road, the driver took a left turn and travelled on the poorly illuminated service road of Chennai Bypass.
When the woman asked the driver why he was taking that route, he replied that he had to drop the two youths.
The vehicle stopped at a desolate spot and one of the youths gagged the woman, while another threatened her at knife point. Latha resisted and bit the hand of one of them.
One of them punched hard on Latha's throat and she lost her consciousness. The youths and the driver robbed her bangles, chains, rings and her mobile phone and fled away in the autorickshaw after pushing her out of the vehicle.
The victim was struggling for life when a motorcyclist came to her help after some time. Regaining her consciousness she called her husband from the motorcyclist's cell phone and informed him about the incident.
The motorcyclist rushed her to a private hospital nearby, from where she was referred to a speciality hospital in Manapakkam. Sources said she was undergoing treatment at the Intensive Care Unit.
