A French woman on pilgrimage in the south Indian state of Tamil Nadu was allegedly sexually assaulted by a local tourist guide who took her to a secluded spot for meditation.
According to the police, a 42-year-old man named Venkatesan from Tiruvannamalai was arrested near the Arunachaleswara temple after an investigation.
The man is accused of taking the woman, believed to be in her forties, to a secluded and restricted area on the Arunachala Hills in Tiruvannamalai under the pretext of meditation and then sexually assaulting her. Tiruvannamalai, a historic town in Tamil Nadu, about 190km southwest of capital Chennai, is renowned for the Arunachaleswara temple, dedicated to the Hindu deity Lord Shiva and the sacred Arunachala Hill.
Police reported that the woman, who arrived in Tiruvannamalai in January this year and was staying at a private lodge, encountered Venkatesan while exploring different ashrams and pilgrimage spots.
On Monday, he allegedly led her to a restricted section of the hill overseen by the state forest department, falsely presenting it as a perfect meditation spot. It was there that the assault reportedly took place.
The woman raised the alarm, drawing the attention of devotees and passers-by on the Girivalam path, a popular circular route around the sacred hill, according to The Indian Express.
The victim’s name has not been revealed to the public to protect her privacy.
Tiruvannamalai’s superintendent of police, M Sudhakar, said: “We formed special teams to identify the suspect. There were multiple witnesses who reported seeing the victim climbing the hills with a local man.
“We narrowed down the probe to five individuals who usually work as tourist guides, including the accused. The victim identified him as Venkatesan when he was paraded before her.”
He added: “Venkatesan is in police custody and we are probing if he engaged in similar crimes in the past.”
The woman has since been admitted to a district hospital for medical check-ups and a police probe is underway.
In 2018, a 21-year-old Russian tourist was drugged and gang-raped in a service apartment in Tiruvannamalai.
The French woman’s sexual assault comes just weeks after a 36-year-old British tourist was allegedly raped and molested at a hotel in Delhi’s Mahipalpur area. Police arrested two people, one who reportedly befriended the woman on Instagram and was accused of rape, and another, a hotel staff member charged with molestation.
The alleged assault on the British tourist occurred just days after a 27-year-old Israeli traveller and her Indian homestay operator were gang-raped near a Unesco World Heritage site in Karnataka.
