Three accused, including the main suspect, in the Bulandshahr gangrape case were arrested by the Uttar Pradesh police on Monday, reported The Indian Express. The men are believed to be part of a tribal group of robbers called the Bawaria gang, which is mainly involved in loot crimes on highways.

The accused had been under police surveillance for the past five months in connection with other cases. They were arrested from Mawana in Meerut district. A police official said, "The 15-member gang was active in UP, Bihar, Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Uttarakhand. They were also involved in a dacoity in Hanumangarh area of Rajasthan."

On the same day, the Allahabad High Court asked the Akhilesh Yadav government to file its response about handing over the probe to the Central Bureau of Investigation.

A group of men had raped a 35-year-old woman and her teenage daughter on the Delhi-Kanpur highway when the family was travelling from Noida to Shahjahanpur to attend a relative’s funeral. The men allegedly surrounded their car and then forced all of them into a field nearby. There, they assaulted the woman and the 15-year-old girl and robbed the family. The incident took place barely 100 metres from a police post in Bulandshahr.