The British woman, who jumped from a hotel balcony in Agra fearing sexual assault, has said that she shouted for help for more than an hour, as two men, including the hotel manager, tried to force their way into the room.
She described as “disgusting” the behavior of other hotel residents for not coming to her help. But she praised the rickshaw-driver who agreed to take her to the police station.
“He was amazing. I don’t know his name and I don’t know how to thank him.”
Recounting her ordeal in a BBC interview, Jessica Davies (31), a dental hygienist from London, said she was terrified and used furniture to barricade her room.
“I held my key in the lock and I could feel them turning it from the other side,” she told the BBC’s South Asia correspondent Andrew North.
Ms. Davies, who suffered injuries in both legs in the fall, denied that she had asked for a wake-up call, and said she had set her phone alarm for 4.30 a.m. to catch a taxi for an early train to Jaipur.
She said she was “surprised” by a knock at her door at 3.45 .am. Still in her pyjamas, she opened the door to find the hotel manager asking if she wanted to take a shower — and offering a massage.
“He was showing me this oil he had,” she said.
When he refused to go away, Ms. Davies said, she barricaded herself inside and started shouting for help. “I was kicking the door and screaming, hoping someone would help”, she said.
“By hook or by crook, this person — or persons — were going to get into my room. I’m 100 per cent certain. And there was only one way out, to jump two floors.”
She said she wanted to talk about her experience “because the shame of sexual assault makes many people too scared to speak out.”
The hotel manager Sachin Chauhan and a security guard are facing charges of sexual harassment.
