A Delhi court will on Friday hear the bail plea of a 50-year-old woman executive, arrested for allegedly assaulting and illegally confining a teenaged girl working as a domestic help in her house.
Metropolitan Magistrate Gomati Manocha, who was scheduled to hear the arguments on the bail application on Thursday, was on leave due to which it was deferred till Friday.
The counsel for accused Vandana Dheer, who is in judicial custody till October 15, had on Wednesday claimed in the court that the alleged victim was mentally unstable.
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According to the court sources, the bone ossification test of the victim has been conducted to ascertain her actual age and the report is expected on Friday.
When Ms. Dheer was produced before the court, her counsel had said that injury marks were there on the girl’s body since she started working as a maid in her house here and her client was continuously giving her medical treatment for it.
The police, however, had opposed Ms. Dheer’s claim and said there were grievous injury marks on the girl’s body, including a deep cut mark on her head and the victim had herself stated during questioning that she was beaten and confined to the house.
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The victim, a resident of Jharkhand, was rescued from Ms. Dheer’s Vasant Kunj home where she had been working as a domestic help and was admitted to Safdarjung Hospital with severe injuries.
The girl was badly injured and rescued by a joint team of NGO Shakti Vahini and the Delhi Police from the ground floor of Ms. Dheer’s residence on the evening of September 30.
Ms. Dheer was arrested on October 1 after the police filed a case under various sections of the IPC and under the provisions of the Bonded Labour Act.
The girl had reportedly told the police that she had been working with Ms. Dheer for the past one year without getting any renumeration and used to get beaten up almost every day as her employer was apparently not happy with her work.