Mumbai: In a case starkly resembling the recent stalking of a 29-year-old DJ by two men in an SUV in Chandigarh, the Amboli police arrested a Malad-based IT professional on Tuesday afternoon for stalking a fashion designer around 2 am on Monday.

The accused, Nitesh Kumar Sharma, who was driving a Honda Civic, allegedly tailed the complainant, who was with her two children.

Sharma later stood outside the woman’s building and went up to ring her doorbell, but left soon after she raised an alarm.

The complainant then lodged a complaint at the Amboli police station and officials arrested Sharma by booking him under Section 354(d) of the Indian Penal Code, which pertains to stalking. Stating that Sharma had been arrested, Bharat Gaikwad, senior police inspector of Amboli police station, said, “We are questioning the residents of the complainant’s building, who helped her, as well as other eyewitnesses.”

Mr Gaikwad said the complainant was returning from a party in Andheri with her children and a friend in her BMW early on Monday morning, and they were on the way to her residence in Shastri Nagar in Lokhandwala. After chasing the complainant’s car, Kumar allegedly went up to her residence and rang her doorbell. The woman then alerted her neighbours and security guards over the intercom, and they came to her rescue and escorted Kumar off the building’s premises.

Later that day, the woman approached Amboli police regarding the incident and put up a post on social networking site Facebook along with the accused’s photo from a CCTV camera grab.

The incident is similar to the case where the Chandigarh police had lodged a complaint against two men for allegedly stalking a DJ, who is the daughter of a senior bureaucrat, on Friday night. One the two accused men is Vikas Barala, the son of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Haryana chief Subhash Barala.

Section 354d

(Stalking) Any man who follows a woman and contacts, or attempts to contact, such woman to foster personal interaction repeatedly despite a clear indication of disinterest by such woman

Punishment Whoever commits the offence of stalking shall be punished on first conviction with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three years, and shall also be liable to fine; and be punished on a second or subsequent conviction, with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to five years, and shall also be liable to fine’.