Mumbai, July 23 (PTI): A 10-year-old girl trying to escape lecherous boys following her in a jeep caught the edge of her skirt in a rear wheel and was dragged along for several feet.

The schoolgirl has been in hospital with two broken vertebrae since the July 14 incident and would take months to recover, her mother said. The girl also suffered a fracture on her right hand, several bruises, and injuries to her hip and a leg.

The victim was returning home from her coaching classes when the young men began following her, making lewd remarks.

“She was probably not their target, because there were older girls in the group,” said deputy commissioner of police Niket Kaushik. As she tried to flee, “her skirt accidentally got entangled and she was dragged for about eight-ten feet”.

Kaushik said there were three persons in the jeep — two of them minors — apart from the driver.

The police have arrested the driver, Mahendra Kamble, and the jeep’s owner, Anil Parkar.

They have been booked for rash and negligent driving as well as outraging a woman’s modesty, although the first information report did not mention the last charge, Kaushik said.

Both have been granted bail after three days in judicial custody.