The Jaipur police has re-opened investigation into an alleged attempted kidnap case that catapulted a young city girl into the limelight, making her a local hero and eventually getting her the National Bravery Award for 2013.
Jaipur girl Maleika Singh Tak was conferred the Geeta Chopra Award for bravery—one of the four major categories under the National Bravery Awards—by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Friday in New Delhi, even as investigations by the Jaipur police found that the incident for which she was awarded, did not even take place.
A student of the Maharani Gayatri Devi girls' school here, Maleika was selected for the awards, by the Indian Council for Child Welfare (ICCW), for taking on four men who tried to kidnap her on February 15 last year.
The girl had reportedly pulled out a small knife she had in her bag leading to the “kidnappers”, who had come in a SUV, running away from the scene. The incident had made front page headlines in the local newspapers.
However, following an investigation, the Shyam Nagar police station, where the girl had filed a complaint, concluded that the incident had never occurred.
In its Final Report — a copy of which has been accessed by The Hindu — the police concluded that the girl's charges could not be corroborated, either by any eyewitnesses or by the video footage from a security camera installed at the venue.
The ICCW had sought a factual report from the district administration on the matter on Monday. Acting on that, District Collector Krishna Kunal asked the police for a report.
“We had received a letter from the district collector asking for the factual report in this case. We found that a FR had been filed by the investigating officer in October 2013. According to that report, the incident was not found to have taken place. We communicated this to the Collector,” Sanjay Shrotriya, Deputy Commissioner of Police (South) told The Hindu .
“But later, the girl's father approached us and said the police's FR was based on faulty conclusions and requested us to re-open investigations. So the case will now be re-investigated by a higher-ranked officer now [Deputy SP]. We communicated this also to the Collector,” said Mr. Shrotriya.
According to the police, the CCTV footage from the venue did not show four men in a SUV trying to kidnap the girl. All that the footage showed was a biker approaching the girl, with whom she had an argument for a while, the police found.
However, according to the district administration, drawing any conclusions at the moment would be premature. “I saw the FR by the police...the case will be re-investigated...it would be premature to call it a fake incident at the moment,” Jaipur Collector Krsihna Kunal told The Hindu .
The girl and her family stand by their account of the incident.
