Kasaragod: A 12-year-old girl was kidnapped at knifepoint and sexually assaulted while she was walking to a madrasa, according to an FIR registered by Bekal Police on Monday. The assault happened around 7 am one month ago, the girl told Bekal police Sunday night.

The girl was gagged with a shawl and assaulted allegedly in the sit-out of a building close to the grama panchayat office near her house, according to the complaint. She reportedly told the police that the assaulter was a migrant worker.

However, a medical examination at the District Hospital in Kanhangad confirmed penetrative sexual assault. "But doctors said her wounds are one week old. Not more than two weeks old," an investigating officer said.

Police are not ruling out the possibility that the assault was committed by someone she knows. The suspicion became stronger after police checked out the building where the assault allegedly happened and found contradictions in her statement.

The girl is the youngest of eight siblings and stays at her mother's ancestral house for education. Her eldest sister is married. "She revealed her ordeal to her eldest sister when both of them visited their father's house recently," the officer said.