The Khar police have detained five navy personnel for molesting a 25-year-old lady in a Bandra pub after getting drunk in the early hours of Sunday. The culprits, all navymen, further summoned autorickshaws and chased the victim and her spouse all the way to Borivli.

The police sources informed the incident occured between 12.30am and 4am on Sunday. The victim had visited a pub at Pali village with her husband and two friends. The five navymen were already at the pub in intoxicated state. The victim is a banker from Gujarat whiles the culprits—Tirthnath Dilipnath (25), Ashish Jaikisan (29), Maheshwar Singh (26), Chandan Mishra (26) and Shyam Bhandare (29)—are class IV personnel.

 

"One of the accused purportedly passed bawdy comments at the victim. Soon, a fight ensued between the victim's husband and the accused. His colleagues from the navy joined in and they overpowered the victim, her husband and their friends. The bouncers in the pub interfered and drove the accused out. The accused then waited till 1.30pm for the pub to down shutters," a police official said. The couple called an autorickshaw to leave, thinking that the nightmare was over.

But the navymen chased them from the pub in Bandra all the way till Borivli in autorickshaw via the Western Express Highway for nearly 40 minutes. At Vile Parle, one of the accused leaned out of his auto and grabbed a rod near the victim's seat in her auto. He shouted at her for complaining to the bouncers of the pub. The shaken couple asked the auto driver to speed up.

Frightened, the victim alerted the police by dialing emergency number 100 after which the Kasturba Marg police at Borivli East dispatched a police van and the culprits were interrupted near a flyover in Borivli. They were detained and the victim's statement was recorded. As the pub falls in the jurisdiction of Khar police station, the FIR was transferred to Khar by the Kasturba Marg police.

The culprits have been booked under sections 143, 146, 147, 149, 354 and 341 of IPC for unauthorized assembly, rioting, molestation and wrongful constraint. They were produced before a holiday court and remanded in police custody till April 27. Navy officials visited the Khar police station on Sunday. Once the accused get bail, the navy will take their custody.