Delhi Horror: Cab Driver Accused of 10-Year-Old Girl’s Rape and Murder Allegedly Cleaned Vehicle, Took Another Ride After Crime
New Delhi: A commercial cab driver accused of abducting, raping and murdering a 10-year-old girl in Delhi’s Mehrauli allegedly attempted to erase evidence before resuming work as if nothing had happened, according to police sources.
Investigators said the accused, Basu Singh, changed his clothes by the roadside after the incident and later thoroughly cleaned the cab in an alleged attempt to remove forensic evidence. Police claimed that after washing the vehicle, he accepted another booking, picked up a passenger from Chakkarpur in Gurugram and dropped the rider in Nangloi.
According to police, Singh has a criminal history spanning more than a decade. He is facing at least five criminal cases, including charges of molestation, rioting and attempted murder, registered in Bihar’s Khagaria district in 2015, 2017, 2018 and 2022.
While Delhi Police are yet to receive an official dossier from Bihar Police, Singh reportedly claimed during questioning that the cases stemmed from a long-running land dispute involving his family. A relative told The Times of India that one of the cases was linked to a protest during a festival.
Police said they have seized the clothes Singh was allegedly wearing at the time of the crime, which were also seen in CCTV footage. The footage reportedly shows him cleaning the cab near his employer’s residential building in Gurugram shortly after the incident. A security guard at the building also reportedly saw him there.
As the investigation progressed, police reached Singh’s registered accommodation in Gurugram, where his brother informed them that he was not home and showed officers CCTV cameras installed in the area. Investigators then used technical surveillance to trace the suspect and arrested him while he was heading towards Vikaspuri after dropping the passenger in Nangloi.
Police said Singh underwent a potency test on Wednesday. During interrogation, he allegedly told investigators that he was familiar with the 12-km route between the location where the girl was kidnapped and the spot where her body was later dumped because he frequently drove through the area.
Before working as a cab driver, Singh was employed as a security guard. His employer, Ankit, an aspiring businessman, told TIO that Singh had previously worked in the housing society where he lived.
Ankit said he had purchased a second-hand car to start a cab business and handed it over to Singh in February this year because the driver was already registered and verified with a cab aggregator.
“My interactions with him were mostly limited to collecting the car rental. He had only told me multiple times that he had some family dispute,” Ankit recalled.
He added that police informed him about the incident on Monday. “What I thought would be my first business venture has ended in failure,” he said. Meanwhile, the victim’s father has demanded capital punishment for the accused.