IIT-Guwahati professor accused of rape by office assistant, arrested

Guwahati, Dec 16: The dean of academic affairs at the IIT has been arrested for allegedly raping an office assistant, a senior police officer said on Tuesday.

"A case was registered against IIT Guwahati Professor Alok Kumar Ghosal at the Panbazar Women police station here... He was brought to the police station for examination last night and now he has been arrested," Guwahati City Senior Superintendent of Police AP Tiwari told reporters.

"We got some evidence and found that there is a need to arrest him for proper investigation," added Tiwari.

The case against the dean has been registered under Section 376(2)(b) of IPC (public servant taking advantage of his official position and committing rape on a woman).

An IIT-G official, speaking on the development, said, "A case was registered by an office assistant against our Dean, Professor Ghosal of the Chemical Engineering Department.

The police had come yesterday to the IIT-G campus with a notice but as he was not present, the institute's authority accepted it and assured it would be handed to him."

"Before the notice could be handed to Prof Ghosal, we learnt that the police had taken him into custody outside the campus.

According to the SSP, today Prof Ghosal has been arrested. The assistant made the accusation 11 days after the alleged event," the official said without mentioning the date when the complaint was made.

PTI