MARDAN, April 10: Two minors were sexually assaulted in different areas of Mardan on Sunday, hospital and police sources said. The officials of Rustam police station, quoting a woman, said that her six-year-old daughter was playing with other children in a nearby street in the Bazaar Kallay area when a local took her to his guestroom and assaulted her.

She told police that they rushed the victim girl to district headquarters hospital. The child could neither walk normally nor could talk when she returned home after the incident, she added. Police arrested the accused and registered a case against him on the complaint of the victim’s mother. In the second incident, a seven-year-old boy was assaulted by his neighbour in Jamal Gari area.

Police said that the victim was shifted to hospital in critical condition after the accused took him to a deserted building in the locality and assaulted him. Police arrested the accused and registered a case under section 377 against him.

The doctors at district headquarters hospital also confirmed both the cases. The local chapter of Society for Protection of the Rights of the Child (SPARC) condemned both the incidents and demanded of the provincial government to take stern action against the accused as well as compensate the families of the affected children.