Bhubaneswar, June 11: A 19-year-old girl today lodged a complaint with Kharavela Nagar police alleging that a youth threatened to throw acid on her and her friends as she had refused to have physical relationship with him.

A police officer said they were trying to trace the youth, who had become friendly with the girl after a few mobile phone calls.

The youth had identified himself as a journalist working with a vernacular newspaper and promised to arrange a job for her in the city, following which she came down here and initially lived at Nayapalli.

“My family is not financially well off and I wanted to earn my living. He introduced himself as Subhasish Sahu and gave me an appointment letter for the post of a receptionist at the corporate office of a private mobile service provider firm in Fortune Tower,” said the girl.

She added that the original name of the youth was Sumant Sahu of Bantala in Angul district.

“He took me to Puri instead of taking me to the office on the day of my interview. When I confronted him, he said I would get the job if I had physical relationship with him.

“I refused to obey and took a bus back to Bhubaneswar. After that he had been calling me up, and yesterday, he came to the hostel, and in the presence of three of my roommates, he threatened to throw acid on us,” she said.

She alleged that the youth had borrowed money on some pretext or the other and was not returning it.

Initially, Kharavela Nagar police had refused to entertain their complaint on the ground that the girl should approach Nayapalli police as the incident had first occurred in their jurisdiction, where the girl used to stay before shifting out of that area.

Inspector in charge of Kharavela Nagar police station Manoj Samant said: “She has given the youth’s mobile phone number.” The cops, however, have found his mobile phone switched off.

Lawyer Siddhart Das said that in such case, the accused could be booked under sections 506 and 354 of the Indian Penal Code. Both these sections are non-bailable and draw jail terms for not less than seven years.

“But, it depends on the police how they will deal with the case,” said Das.