He made our lives hell, say neighbours in slum

The brother, mother and father of Ram Singh, the key accused in the gang-rape case, leave their house at Ravidass Camp slum in New Delhi yesterday.

Reuters/New Delhi

Some of Ram Singh’s neighbours grimaced with disgust as they remembered a man they described as a menace, who was violent, drank heavily and used to harass women by peeking at them as they undressed.

The alleged ringleader in a gang-rape and murder case that sparked outrage across India, Singh was found dead in his prison cell yesterday, once again putting the New Delhi slum he used to call home in an unwanted spotlight.

“People had forgotten about this whole thing. Now all of a sudden, this idiot hangs himself and look how this is in focus again,” said an auto-rickshaw driver in the cramped and grubby Ravidass Camp slum. “He won’t let us live in peace. Whatever peace we were slowly getting has now gone again.”

Singh was accused along with four other men and a juvenile of raping and fatally wounding a 23-year-old woman on a moving bus in December. All six pleaded not guilty although police say Singh had confessed to the crime under interrogation.  

Authorities in New Delhi’s Tihar Jail said Singh hanged himself before dawn. His father rejected that explanation, saying he believed his son was murdered.

Legal experts said Singh’s death does not undermine the prosecution’s case against the other accused, which was largely based on DNA evidence and the testimony of the rape victim before she died and her friend.

“There will be no impact on the trial. This is a case of gang-rape where all are held equally responsible, you can’t say one is more to blame than the other,” said Rebecca Mammen John, a Supreme Court lawyer who has worked on many rape cases.

Ram Singh, 34, and his brother Mukesh, who was also accused in the case, were originally from Rajasthan. Like millions of Indians in search of work and better prospects, the family migrated to the capital in the 1990s.

Ram Singh found work as a bus driver, a job he stuck with even after an accident in 2009 that fractured his right arm so badly that doctors had to insert a rod to support it.

He later appeared on a reality TV show in a compensation dispute with a bus owner, who in turn accused Singh of “drunken, negligent and rash driving.” In the show, the moustachioed, slightly-built man was seen walking stiffly and holding his right arm at an awkward angle.

Singh and three of the other accused lived in a poor pocket in the otherwise largely middle-class neighbourhood of RK Puram, whose tree-lined boulevards contrast with the narrow lanes and open sewers of their slum.

Residents say Singh, a heavy drinker with a violent temper, was a menace to an otherwise peaceful neighbourhood.

They said they remember an elderly woman confronting Singh about why he was always drunk. He is said to have replied, “let me have my way. I will be world famous like this one day.”

One neighbour, 19-year-old Priya, remembers Singh as a “disgusting” man.

“Sometimes, while we were changing clothes or bathing, he would peep into our house. When confronted, he would be very rude and say it’s his right to stand anywhere.”

Singh eloped with a neighbour, a married mother of three, more than a decade ago, residents say. She died in 2008 and Singh eventually came back to the slum.

Although he had few friends, one slum resident said Singh was often seen with four people who were later to become his fellow accused in the gang-rape case.

Timeline of events

IANS/New Delhi

Ram Singh, the main accused in the December 16, 2012 gang-rape of a 23-year-old woman committed suicide in Delhi’s Tihar Jail yesterday morning. Here is a timeline of events since the brutal incident.

* December 16, 2012: A 23-year-old physiotherapy student is raped and tortured along with her male friend by five men and a juvenile in a moving bus in New Delhi. The victims are admitted to Safdarjung Hospital.

* December 18: Protests start in the capital over the gang-rape incident.

* December 23: The protests turn violent at India Gate in the national capital as demonstrators defy prohibitory orders. Delhi police constable Subhash Tomar is seriously injured during clashes.

* December 25: Tomar dies of injuries.

* December 26: The gang-rape victim is air lifted to Singapore’s Mount Elizabeth Hospital after her condition deteriorates in Safdarjung Hospital in Delhi.

* December 29: The brave-heart succumbs to her injuries in Singapore, 13 days after the brutal incident.

* December 30: The woman’s body is flown back to India from Singapore. She is cremated the same day.

* January 28: The Juvenile Justice Board declares the sixth accused a minor.

* February 2: The five accused are charged with 13 offences, including murder and sent to judicial custody in Tihar Jail.

* February 28: The Juvenile Justice Board frames rape, murder charges against the minor accused.

* March 11: Ram Singh, the main accused in the incident commits suicide.

Tihar registers first suicide in 2013

The Tihar Jail, which houses over 12,000 prisoners, counted the first suicide in 2013 when Ram Singh allegedly hanged himself yesterday morning, an official said. “(The suicide by Ram Singh is) this year’s first (suicide) and the third suicide in the last 15 months in Tihar Jail,” said the official. The jail reported a total of 18 deaths, including two suicides in 2012. “There have been 18 deaths in Tihar Jail in 2012 out of which 16 were natural, while two were cases of suicide,” Vimla Mehra, director general of prisons told reporters. Another official said footage of the jail’s CCTV camera will be available for scrutiny during a magisterial inquiry ordered into Ram Singh’s alleged suicide.