Calcutta, June 8: A woman in her mid 20s was gagged and raped in a shuttle car she had got into from the Exide crossing in south Calcutta last night to reach Sealdah station to take a train back home.

The driver of the shuttle car — a white Swift D’zire (WB04F 2892) — first robbed of her of valuables and then gagged and raped her, the woman has said in her complaint lodged with the Entally police station.

“We arrested the culprit driver, identified as Mumtaz Khan, 40, and the woman identified him as the culprit. The car was also impounded and kept for forensic examination,” said Pallab Kanti Ghosh, joint commissioner of police, crime.

The police have conducted medical test on the woman and the accused. “We haven’t got the final report, but preliminary report confirmed that she was sexually assaulted,” said a senior officer.

According to the FIR lodged by the woman, she was waiting at the Exide crossing around 11pm to avail transport to reach Sealdah railway station.

“I had come to Calcutta to visit two of my ailing relatives at two different hospitals. It got late and I knew that I had to rush to Sealdah station for the last train…. A white car stopped in front me when I was standing at the Exide crossing and the person on the steering asked me where I wanted to go,” she wrote in her complaint.

“The driver asked for Rs 20 to drop me off at Sealdah,” the woman had mentioned in the FIR. “I did not have any idea of Calcutta roads and I got into the car in good faith… After a few minutes and crossing a few intersections, the car stopped in front of a hospital. I identified it as its glow-sign board was displaying its name — Chittaranjan National Medical College and Hospital.”

According to her complaint, the driver got off the car and approached a youth who was sitting in a taxi parked beside the road. “After a few minutes he returned with the youth. This time the young man was on the driver’s seat and the driver sat next to him. When I wanted to know the reason for bringing the youth, the man said he was not feeling well and the young man would drive the car to Sealdah.”

While talking to policemen, the woman told them that she realised that something was wrong when the car hit a wide road and she asked the driver how long would it take to reach Sealdah .

“I knew that there is a flyover near Sealdah station. But I found no sign of it along the road through which I was going,” the woman told police.

“I had no idea where I was. Suddenly, the man who had picked me up from near Exide crossing asked the youth to stop the car. He then came out and sat next to me,” she told the police.

The man forcefully took away her bag and her two gold bangles.

“I tried to raise an alarm, but he pounced on me and gagged me with my dupatta. I tried to resist him but he forcefully made me lie down on the back seat,” the woman had told the cops.

She came to know that her tormentor’s name was Mumtaz and the boy’s name was Habibul. She said she was pushed out of the car later, and walked until she found a police kiosk. The police said that after the woman narrated her story, they nabbed both Habibul, whom she helped identify, and Mumtaz.