Bengaluru Sweet Shop Employee Caught Filming Inside Women's Toilet; Arrested

A Bengaluru woman took to social media to share her chilling ordeal of being secretly filmed inside the women's restroom of a popular sweet shop on April 25. The 25-year-old shared that she found a hidden phone camera in the restroom at an Anand Sweets outlet in Koramangala. The phone belonged to an employee, who has now been arrested, according to Deccan Herald. "He has confessed to the crime. We are in the process of extracting the video from his mobile phone, which will act as a crucial piece of evidence in the probe," a police investigator told the outlet. 

What went down: Woman shares ordeal

The woman, a local entrepreneur, shared the ordeal in a three-part video on her social media. She said that she had gone to the eatery to use the restroom. However, she immediately noticed a gap in the wall and decided to inspect it. "At the first-floor washroom, I noticed the wall in front wasn't fully made of bricks. Instead, the centre part had fibreglass at the top and wooden strips at the level of the commode. I sensed something was wrong," she said. 

The woman said that she tapped the fibreglass and crouched down to look through the wooden strips. "I saw a phone placed on the other side. I saw the phone move. That's when I realised I was being recorded." The woman immediately alerted the store's manager, who was allegedly dismissive of her complaint. She demanded to check the phones of all employees, but her request fell on deaf ears, and she decided to call the police.

In surveillance footage, the police caught the perpetrator escaping from the back door of the eatery, but he was later apprehended and taken to the police station. The woman continued, "He confessed, claimed he deleted the videos, and begged for forgiveness, even calling me 'didi' (sister) and saying he had a newborn daughter. That only made me angrier. On checking his phone, I found images of other women from the internet alongside his baby's photo."

The woman also shared a written statement on social media.

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Sweet shop's response

The woman said that she emailed Anand Sweet's regional director and arranged a meeting. However, he tried to talk her out of taking action. "He shifted blame, saying the accused worked for a third-party agency (Adityavani) and was a migrant worker they didn't even know," the woman said. The woman broke down in tears and tried to leave his office, but the regional director allegedly blocked her way so that other customers would not see her crying.

Anand Sweets & Savouries issued a statement to Hindustan Times, saying, "...The individual responsible was a technician contracted for maintenance... We are implementing stronger safeguards across all our locations, including appointing female attendants for washrooms, assigning female managers at our stores to address escalations, ensuring separate washrooms for men and women, and conducting daily inspections of all washroom facilities..."