Pune bus rape: How request for food and water led to arrest of Dattaray Gade

The accused, Dattatray Gade (37), was hiding at a farm in Shirur.

Pune Police traced the whereabouts of the 37-year-old culprit in the Pune MSRTC bus rape case as he requested for food and water from a house in his village. The accused was on the run after allegedly raping a woman on a bus at Pune's Swargate bus station.

The accused switched off his mobile phone, but the police managed to reach his village and found out he had visited a house requesting water, Business Standard reported.

Joint commissioner of police Ranjan Kumar Sharma informed, “We received the information that Gade had visited a house asking for food. We rushed to the spot, but he managed to flee. The family in the house gave him a bottle of water.” The family informed the police about the accused, after which the police team resumed the search.

Dattaray Ramdas Gade (37) had been hiding in a paddy field in his native Shirur tehsil when the police officials were searching for him. Over 100 police personnel were on search, using drone cameras and a dog squad.

According to the police, the accused was brought to Pune by 2 am on Friday. He was then sent for a medical examination. The accused will be produced in court later in the day.

Gade, a resident of Gunat village in Pune, is also named in half a dozen cases of theft, robbery, and chain snatching in the Pune and Ahilyanagar districts. He has been out on bail since 2019 in one of the offences.

To nab the culprit, 13 police teams were sent to different parts of Maharashtra. A Rs 1 lakh cash reward was also offered by the Pune police to anyone with information regarding the accused's whereabouts.