The murder of 19-year-old Ankita Bhandari, a receptionist at a resort in Uttarakhand, has sparked violent protests in the area. This was her first job in which she faced the brunt for refusing to provide “special services” to guests. This had been gleaned from her WhatsApp chat with a friend.
Bhandari's Facebook friend reportedly alleged that she was killed because she refused to have sex with guests as demanded by the owner of the resort.
Pulkit Arya, son of now-expelled BJP leader Vinod Arya, has reportedly admitted to have pushed Ankita into the canal following an altercation. He, along with two others, was arrested by the police on Saturday.
Ankita’s WhatsApp chats with her friend seem to confirm that the teenager was being forced into prostitution by the accused men. “They are trying to turn me into a prostitute,” read one one of her messages to a friend, whom she was describing her experience of working as a receptionist at the resort owned by BJP leader’s son.
In one of her WhatsApp message, Ankita also wrote: “I may be poor, but I won’t sell myself for Rs 10,000”.
Screenshots of the chat, which have been going viral since Saturday, also reveal that Ankita had given Pulkit Arya an earful after he allegedly tried to kiss her. She also told her friend that a drunk guest had once forcefully hugged her but one of the three accused, Ankit Gupta, an assistant to Pulkit, asked her to keep mum about it “to avoid an escalation” on the issue.
“Today, Ankit came to me and told me that he wanted to talk to me about something. I agreed and went to a corner near my reception desk. There, he asked me I was ready to give ‘extra services’ to a guest who was willing to pay Rs 10,000 to your resort,” Ankita wrote in a WhatsApp message to her friend.
“To my reply, he then tried to clarify and say that he was not asking me to do it but to inform him in case I knew of any other girl who might be willing. But I know that he had directd that offer towards me only, thinking I might agree after learning of the amount (sic),” she added.
She also told her friend that Ankit, on directions of Pulkit Arya, had once told her that she “may be fired from her job and replaced with another girl if she doesn’t agree to give special services to guests.”
An audio clip of a call recording reportedly from the victim to a resort employee has also gone viral. Manveer Singh Chauhan, the chef of Vanatara resort Yamkeshwar block of Pauri district, told the police that a sobbing Ankita called her on the day she was killed and asked him to bring her bag. But when the one of the staff went with the bag, he couldn’t find Ankita. She was last seen at the resort at 3 pm on September 18.
Just hours before her death, Ankita’s Facebook friend had called her but her phone went unreachable around 8:30 pm. Unable to connect to her, he called Pulkit Arya, who said she had gone to her room to sleep.
The next day, he called Pulkit again but his phone was switched off as well. He then rang up Ankit, the resort’s manager, who said she was at the gym. He then spoke to the resort's chef, who told him he had not seen the woman that day.
