Pune fearful after rape,murder of engineer

Police said they had offered Nayna a lift in their car as she waited for a public transport from outside the office. They were all caught on camera (CCTV) at a few ATMs,drawing money using Naynas credit and debit cards. Questioned by police,they admitted on Sunday that they had gangraped her before killing her and smashing her face.

Naynas husband Abhijeet Pujari is still in a state of shock. Nayna called me at 7.58 pm and said she was taking a private transport as the office cab was not available then. She was in a hurry to reach home as she had been on a fast and wanted to break it at home. So she was not willing to wait. In fact,she missed the 7.30 office drop that day because as a group leader she had to finish extra work. She was the star employee of the company, he said.

Hes looking at the company to help him in the fight to ensure all the culprits get maximum punishment. Speaking to The Indian Express from his Dubai office,Faisal Husain,CEO,Synechron Technology,is equally eager to bring the culprits to book.

Nayna was one of our best employees and we were about to declare Rs 10 lakh reward for information about her on October 9 when her body was found. We share the grief of Abhijeet and Naynas mother and will be with the family in the difficult period ahead, he said. We only wish Nayna had waited some time before leaving the office. She asked for a cab at 7.48 as per the log book and was out of the premises by 7.52. A cab was ready by 8.15 pm, he said.

According to Abhijeet,there was nothing unusual in hailing the cab operated by Wings taxi service as it was plying for Zensar Technologies,another IT company located nearby. Raut had given his car on contract to Zensar Technologies for ferrying its employees for the last six months and Thakur was the driver. Now,the police suspect there may have been a fourth person in the car and efforts are on to identify that person.

This is not the first time that the Pune police have had to tackle such a crime. Almost two years ago on November 1,2007 22-year-old Jyotikumari Choudhary,an employee of Spectramind,the BPO division of Wipro,based in Punes IT hub Hinjewadi,was raped and murdered,again allegedly by the driver of the firm that had been outsourced the job of picking and dropping its employees. Police apprehended Purushottam Borate,the driver,and his friend Pradeep Yashwant Kokade and charged them with rape and murder of Jyotikumari.

As in Naynas case,the body was recovered from a spot located some 30 km from Pune. In this case too,an attempt was made to camouflage the identity of the victim by smashing her face with a rock.

Pune police say IT companies have learned nothing from past experience. We had issued guidelines to the companies for the security of their staff,especially womenemployees. Regulation on cab drivers is essential.

Police guidelines to firms stipulate:

• A guard should accompany a woman employee for pick-up in night (starting 8 pm) and before 6 am

• Men should be picked up first and then the women staff

• While dropping them,women should be dropped first,then the men

• Women employees should not sit on the front seat next to the driver

• Updating the drop-sheet comprising the time of drops along with the signature of the employee should be done by the driver

Synechron has now decided not to keep any women employees in either of its two Pune premises Kharadi and Hinjewadi beyond 5 pm. They are being issued laptop computers and Blackberry phones so that they can attend to overseas clients from home,on phone.