A 15-year-old girl in Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur Kheri district was reportedly attacked by a stalker in a busy market on Wednesday afternoon. The attacker allegedly kept stabbing the girl with a sword till one of her hands was severed.
According to the Times of India report, the accused, identified as a Vinod Chaurasia, had been following the girl, a class IX student, for a couple of days.
On the day of the incident, when Chaurasia spotted the victim at a local market, he approached her but she rejected his advances, like she had several times in the past.
Angered by the refusal, Chaurasia grabbed a sword from a nearby shop and attacked the victim.
"One of her hands fell off, while the man kept striking at her other hand even as people overpowered him and rescued the girl from certain death," eyewitness Akhilesh Rastogi, a local, told TOI.
The girl, who was referred to Lucknow by the district hospital, is in a critical condition.
Superintendent of Police S Chinappa said they are waiting for the victim's health to stabilise before proceeding with the case. "Our priority is the health of the girl, who is in a serious condition. Once her condition improves, we will record her statement, following which the motive of the attack can be clearly ascertained."
Although the malaise of stalking is not new to Indian society, an alarming number of stalking-related cases of violence have come to light from different parts of the country in the last few days.
Recently, a school girl was stabbed to death in UP by a group of stalkers after she refused their advances. In another incident, a 21-year-old aspiring air hostess was stabbed in Delhi by a man in full public view in the Mansarovar Park area of Shahdara.
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