Fury in India After Canteen Owner Kidnapped And Raped College Student For 17 MONTHS

The student says she was the tortured and repeatedly raped by Satyaprakash Singh. Pictured: Indian students of Saint Joseph Degree college during an anti-rape protest in Hyderabad

An Indian student says she was kidnapped, tortured and repeatedly raped by a canteen owner for 17 months after he drugged her food at college. 

The 20-year-old disappeared from her home in Hyderabad in April, 2012, and only managed to escape this month. 

News of the kidnap has sparked protests on the streets of Hyderabad and more than 15,000 people have joined an online campaign in support of the girl. 

Satyaprakash Singh, owner of a canteen at TRR College, has been arrested.

The case will be heard under the stricter laws of the Nirbhaya act, which was introduced this year following the gang rape and murder of a student on a bus in Delhi. 

Tarun Joshi, deputy commissioner of South Zone, was quoted by Gulf News as saying: 'We have booked a case under the Nirbhaya act and an impartial and prompt investigation has been taken up.'

The student said Singh drugged her by mixing something in her food and she was then taken to a flat where he raped and tortured her and chained her with a belt. 

During the horrifying 17 month ordeal, the student says at one point three police officers visited the flat where she was being kept after a complaint by neighbours.

However, instead of helping her she said they too raped her at Singh's suggestion before leaving. 

The suspect will be tried under the same stricter laws brought in following the death of the Delhi student. Four men have been sentenced to death for the crime

She said Singh kept her in one flat for the first month but moved her to another at Bala Nagar, Gayatri Nagar, with the help of another woman. 

The student said he claimed he had raped and murdered Muslim girls before her and had been protected from prosecution by powerful friends. 

In the complaint to police, she said: 'He used to say that I am the fifth Muslim girl who he has raped and killed and thrown in a river. 

'He claimed that his father is and former Defence employee and his brother is a criminal lawyer who always saves him from getting into the police net', according to Gulf News. 

In May 2012, she told police she was able to steal Singh's phone and call her brother. 

However, despite her family going to police, she says officers did not respond to the claims. 

The student only managed to escape on September 4, this year, after Singh got drunk and left the door open.

During her ordeal, she says she was forced to have an abortion after becoming pregnant in captivity.

Her story is the latest high profile rape case in India to shock the country and police have banned further demonstrations about it after scores of people took to the streets. 

The outcry over the Delhi gang-rape led to a tougher law in India against rapists, but cases of sexual violence have continued throughout the country.

This month, a school bus cleaner was arrested this month in Mumbai on suspicion of raping a four-year-old girl after luring her to the back of the vehicle. 

A toddler is also in a critical condition in Ludhiana, Punjab province, after being snatched from home and then raped and dumped at the roadside. 

Last month, a 22-year-old photojournalist was raped by five men in Mumbai while on a photo assignment at an abandoned textile mill with a male colleague. 

On average, a case of rape in India is reported every 21 minutes.