According to local media reports, a 25-year-old man in the Sola district of Ahmedabad has been arrested on suspicion of abducting a young girl, beating and sexually assaulting her with a 4-ft iron rod and then discarding her to run home to her family.

The girl’s father complained to Sola police, who told the Times of India they had recovered a rod allegedly used in the attack and registered a complaint of rape.

A police official told the newspaper the six-year-old was playing on a construction site next to one where her father was working when the alleged attack took place. 

"She said that a security guard of the adjoining construction site had taken her to a basement at the site, molested her [and] beat her with a TMT iron bar... [Her father] and other labourers rushed to the site and confronted the man, who fled,” the official said.

Police inspector BV Gohil named the arrested suspect as Kaushal Chauhan, who "maintains he had altercations with the family earlier and that they may have decided to get even”.

The brutal assault allegations come as India debates what a string of recent attacks on women say about the "male mind-set” of the nation.

On Sunday night, BBC Four is set to broadcast for a second time the controversial documentary about the Delhi gang-rape that has been banned in India itself.

India’s Daughter includes an interview with one of the men convicted of abducting, raping and assaulting with an iron bar an aspiring physiotherapist on 16 December 2012.

Criticising the Indian government’s attempts to suppress the film from being shown to both domestic and international audiences, opposition politician Priya Dutt said: "I am very shocked at the decision to ban the video. Rapes happen every single day and this has to be exposed. The documentary didn't defend the rape. In fact it showed the mindset of the rapist.”

(independent.co.uk)