Noida, 29 December: Officials stated on Thursday that the Noida police detained a lady from a luxury society on allegations of beating and holding her domestic worker prisoner for over two months. “Shefali Koul, who lives in the Cleo County society in Sector 121, was apprehended from her home on Wednesday evening,” a police official stated. A video purportedly showing Koul, 40, pulling her 20-year-old domestic help out of a lift surfaced two days earlier.
According to the police, Koul was first charged under Indian Penal Code sections 344 (illegal incarceration for more than 10 days), 323 (voluntarily inflicting harm), and 504 (insult).
“Charges under IPC 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) and the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act have now been added to the case,” a local Phase 3 police station officer said. Koul, a lawyer by profession, was hauled to a local court on Thursday afternoon, according to the official. Koul had stated before her arrest that she did not abuse her help and did not hold her at home against her choice.
According to the help’s father, who filed a police report, his daughter had a six-month contract with Koul that expired on October 31.
“After the contract expired, my daughter wanted to leave her job, but she was denied. She held my daughter captive at her house, assaulting her and abusing her,” the domestic help’s father said.
The domestic help on Monday attempted to flee Koul’s fourth-floor flat by using a ‘dupatta’ as a rope, someone alerted the police, causing a team of emergency 112 service to arrive, he added. “My daughter was then taken to the local police station,” the father stated, pleading with the officers to file a FIR and pursue legal action in the issue.
