Bengaluru woman 'abducted, assaulted, stripped' over loan dispute

Woman accused four people of abducting her and her young son.

BENGALURU: A dispute over loans and mounting interest allegedly took a horrifying turn after a woman accused four people of abducting her and her young son, confining them, assaulting her and threatening to circulate a video of her after allegedly forcing her to strip.Fathima (name changed), who works as a domestic help, had borrowed Rs 50,000 from accused Nazath Begum, agreeing to repay it in weekly instalments of Rs 5,000.She had also borrowed Rs 1 lakh from Reshma Banu around two years ago and was paying monthly interest. Due to financial difficulties, she claimed she had fallen behind on both payments.Fathima accused Reshma of repeatedly demanding the pending interest and visiting her house, prompting her to block Reshma’s phone numbers. She further claimed that the threats continued through Reshma’s mother, forcing her to stay away from home for nearly two months.On August 27, Nazath called her, claiming she had some work for her and would pay her for it. Fathima went to her house in Metro Layout with her younger son at around 5.30 pm.While she was feeding her son, Nazath stepped outside and spoke to someone. Soon after, Reshma, her husband Suhail and two others entered the house and locked the door.Fathima told police that Suhail demanded Rs 11 lakh, including interest, and hit her hand with a knife. When her son began crying, she claimed Reshma and Suhail assaulted her and snatched her mobile phone.Around 7 pm, she and her son were forced into an auto and taken to a house near Kumbalagodu.At Reshma’s house, both Nazath and Suhail told her to work as a prostitute if she could not repay the money and threatened to bring other men.She and her son were kept locked inside a room overnight. The following day, she developed a fever but was again assaulted by Nazath, Suhail and Saif.In the evening, Fathima claimed Nazath forced her to remove her clothes and recorded a video, threatening to make it viral if she failed to repay the money.The next day, Reshma, Suhail and Nazath took her to a lawyer near a market and made her sign certain papers before returning her to the Kumbalagodu house.The woman eventually managed to alert her family when she was allowed to step out to use the toilet. Her family complained to the police, who rushed to the house and rescued her.Chandra Layout police have arrested Nazath, Reshma and Suhail and are investigating the case. The mobile phones of the accused have been seized and sent to the forensic science laboratory to retrieve data.