Shortly after the nation went to bed on November 2, riding high on the victory of India’s women’s cricket squad in the ICC World Cup, a story of horror was, unbeknownst to others, unfolding in Coimbatore.

As the world learned the next day, a 20-year-old college student had been gang-raped by three men in a deserted area near the compound wall of the Government Polytechnic College (GPT). The incident came to light after the woman’s boyfriend, who had earlier been assaulted with a sickle by the attackers, called the police to report it. Investigators combed the vast vacant plots on the west and southern sides of Brindhavan Nagar, a quiet residential area near the airport and the arterial Avinashi Road, while the perpetrators fled via an exit route to the adjacent Avinashi Road. According to investigators, the three men allegedly forced the woman to scale a compound wall separating Brindhavan Nagar from the scene of the crime around 4 a.m. on November 3.

The woman, in intense trauma, immediately sought refuge in the lane where she landed after climbing the wall. She pressed the doorbell of a house nearby, but when it did not work, she scaled the rather small compound wall in desperation. A man who helped the survivor told The Hindu that she knocked on the door and even switched on an electric motor to draw attention.

However, the residents were asleep. Finding no response, she climbed the stairs to the terrace and managed to hop onto the verandah of a first-floor apartment in an adjacent building.

The woman kept knockin