Crime
Year Ender: Bengal’s shocker RG Kar case in 2024 saw massive protests amid shoddy probe claims

Kolkata, Dec 31: 2024 was an eventful year for West Bengal for several reasons, but the incident that rocked the state and the country was the ghastly rape and murder of a woman doctor of state-run R.G. Kar Medical College & Hospital in Kolkata within the premises in August.
The following sequence of events made the entire investigation process a mere farcical exercise.
The scripted plot started on the morning of August 9 soon after the body of the victim was recovered from the seminar hall within the R.G. Kar premises. As per the victim’s parents, on the same morning, they received subsequent calls from a woman claiming to be an Assistant Superintendent of the hospital making contradictory statements each time.
“First she said that my daughter had become seriously ill. Next, she claimed that my daughter had committed suicide,” claimed the victim’s father to the media persons after the tragedy.
An audio clip of the purported conversation also became viral in the social media then which authenticated the allegations of the victim’s parents.
Kolkata Police started the initial investigation and soon took the prime accused in the case and civic volunteer Sanjay Roy in custody. However, several lapses in the process of initial investigation by the city police started surfacing then. Some of them were lackadaisical in cordoning off the entire crime scene allowing several unwanted individuals crowding there and lapses in the post-mortem process that raised suspicions about the tampering with evidence in the matter.
Following these developments, the civil society flared up in anguish which was followed by a series of protests by people throughout the state. The protests were led by representatives from the medical fraternity in the state.
Slowly, the protest fever gripped other states in the country and subsequently similar protest demonstrations by non-resident Indians settled in different countries abroad also started surfacing.
The ongoing protest demonstrations took a dramatic turn at midnight of August 14 when almost the entire state was on the streets condemning the macabre tragedy as well as demanding the safety of women at the workplace.
A group of miscreants suddenly barged in within the R.G. Kar premises and ransacked portions of the emergency department of the hospital. Later information surfaced that their main target was the floor of the purported “scene of crime” that is the seminar hall where the body of the victim was recovered, clearly hinting that the attack was orchestrated to destroy the evidence. The development also diverted the media attention on that night from the protest or demonstration to the event of ransacking.
This development flared up public protests which were aggravated further by the decision of the junior doctors to go on fast-unto-death protest demanding justice for the victims.
In the meantime, there were two subsequent developments on the legal front. First, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) took charge of the investigation from the city police following an order by a division bench of Calcutta High Court. Secondly, the Supreme Court headed by the then Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud took up the matter for hearing on a suo motu basis.
The initial days of the CBI probe in the matter were highly exciting with information about tampering of evidence during the phase of initial investigation by the city police surfacing one after another.
The excitement reached its peak when CBI arrested the former and controversial principal of R.G. Kar Sandip Ghosh and the former SHO of Tala Police Station Abhijit Mondal on charges of misleading the investigation and tampering with evidence.
All these were going on while the protests were gaining momentum with a group of junior doctors participating in the hunger strike started falling sick one after another. Even the West Bengal government, at that point in time, seemed a bit helpless in the midst of all-around pressure and made desperate attempts to sit at the discussion table with the junior doctors to end the impasse.
However, the series of heartbreaks started soon first with the first charge sheet of CBI identifying the civic volunteer Sanjay Roy as the “sole prime accused” in the crime of rape and murder.
At the same time following a meeting with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, the junior doctors withdrew from the hunger strike which to a large extent dampened the general protest mood involving civil society and common people.
The final blow came on December 13, when a special court in Kolkata granted “default bail” to Ghosh and Mondal in the rape and murder as CBI failed to submit a supplementary charge sheet against the duo within 90 days from the date of their arrests.
Following this development, there was an air of frustration and suspicion about the sincerity with which the central investigating agency also was conducting the probe. Suspicions surfaced further following a report from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) that contradicted several points that surfaced during the course of the investigation.
The first contradiction was about the “scene of crime”. While both Kolkata Police and CBI conducted the investigation considering the seminar hall from where the body of the victim was discovered as the scene of the crime, the CFSL report clearly stated there was no evidence of scuffle at the seminar room thus creating doubts on whether that place was actually the scene of crime or not.
Secondly, the CFSL report, while not ruling out the possibility of murder and crime being conducted by one accused, advocated for further research based on different past scientific reports by experts in similar cases can lead to the final conclusion on whether more than one person was involved in the crime.
At the same time, the CFSL report clearly stated that the confidentiality factor of the post-mortem process of the body of the victim was compromised and standard protocols were not followed during that process.
The seventh point mentioned in the CSFL report is, “Observation of the videography of the PM examination revealed that several people were present inside the post-mortem hall and some of them were taking photographs and making videos on their personal mobile phones, which is against the standard and accepted protocol and practice to maintain confidentiality of the case and dignity of the deceased,” the report said.
Crime
Accused in air hostess sexual assault case was porn addict: Gurugram Police

Gurugram, April 19: Gurugram Police said on Saturday that the accused in the air hostess sexual assault case was a porn addict, an official said.
Gurugram Police Spokesperson Sandeep Kumar said that the accused used to watch porn videos habitually, which was also confirmed from the mobile phone recovered from him.
He said that during police interrogation, it was found that the accused has a B.Sc. (OT) degree from a private institute from the years 2019-2022, and he was an average student in studies.
“For the last five months, he was working as a treatment machine technician in the ICU of the hospital. The accused going to the victim at the time of the incident was confirmed from the CCTV cameras installed in the hospital,” he said.
The Spokesperson said that during interrogation of the accused, it was also found that he had watched porn videos before the incident and even after committing the crime.
“Which is also being confirmed from the search history of the accused’s mobile phone. He was produced before the court on Saturday, from where he was sent to judicial custody for further proceedings,” he said.
Meanwhile, the SIT on Friday nabbed the accused, after analysing at least 800 CCTV cameras installed inside and outside of the hospital, who sexually assaulted the woman when she was on a ventilator.
The accused was identified as Deepak (25), a native of Muzaffarpur in Bihar. The accused had been working as a treatment machine technician in the ICU of the hospital for the past five months and was arrested in the Sadar police station area on Friday.
An official privy to the investigation said that the accused has confessed to his crime in the matter.
“While investigating the incident, eight police teams checked the footage of 800 CCTV cameras installed in the hospital, and around 50 hospital staff, including doctors, were questioned about the incident. Keeping in mind the seriousness of the incident, the police teams investigated from every angle and collected a lot of information related to the incident, as a result of which the police got great success in identifying the accused who committed the crime,” said Arpit Jain, DCP (Headquarters).
On Thursday, Vikas Kumar Arora, Commissioner of Police, Gurugram, had constituted an SIT and ordered the identification and arrest of the accused.
As per the order of the Police Commissioner, an SIT was constituted under the leadership of Arpit Jain, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Headquarters, Gurugram, in which a total of eight different police teams were given special directions and deployed to collect information and evidence related to the incident.
Dr. Sanjay Durani, Medical Superintendent of the hospital, said in a statement that: “We have been informed that the police have identified a suspect who has been taken into custody in connection with the ongoing investigation concerning allegations of sexual assault on a patient. On the basis of information provided to us by the police, we have suspended the suspect employee. As we await the final outcome of the investigation, we will continue to provide full support to the police.”
Crime
Manipur govt launches verification of papers of arms license holders

Imphal, April 19: The Manipur government has launched a drive to verify the licensed arms and asked all the district administrations to examine the papers of the arms license holders and arms dealers, officials said on Saturday.
A senior official said that the Commissioner (Home) has, in an urgent circular, asked the Deputy Commissioners of all 16 districts to take steps to verify the papers of arms license holders and arms dealers in their respective districts.
Accordingly, all the Deputy Commissioners directed the arms license holders and arms dealers to submit their papers in their nearest or respective police stations on or before April 25.
“Non-compliance with the orders may lead to penalisation and cancellation of arms license,” the official said, referring to the circular of the Commissioner (Home). Till March 6, around 1,000 looted and illegally held weapons, including many sophisticated arms, and a huge cache of ammunition, have been returned to the security forces since Manipur Governor Ajay Kumar Bhalla appealed for the first time on February 20.
The initiative to recover the looted and illegally held arms began on May 31, 2023, when former Chief Minister N. Biren Singh made an appeal to all concerned to surrender the firearms looted from security forces and police armouries.
Officials said that before Singh’s resignation as Chief Minister on February 9, a total of 3,422 firearms had been voluntarily surrendered to the authorities and police stations in different districts.
Various official reports, political parties claimed that during the ethnic riots, which broke out in Manipur on May 3, 2023, over 6,020 varied types of sophisticated arms and lakhs of different types of ammunition were looted from the police stations and police outposts by the mobs, attackers and militants.
Crime
Put under house arrest again, says Mirwaiz Umar Farooq

Srinagar, April 18: Senior religious and Huriyat Conference (HC) Chairman, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, said on Friday that authorities have placed him under house arrest, thereby denying him the right to offer congregational prayers during the day.
Mirwaiz Farooq said on X, “Every Friday I am put under arbitrary house arrest ! Putting pressure on me not to speak up, the ban also aims to weaken the centrality of Muslim institutions of the valley-the Jama Masjid, office of the Mirwaiz, and cause collective grief to Muslims and all those who oppose this authoritarian and sectarian outlook. My house detention case is still pending in court, where I am seeking relief from the Hon’ble High Court, but In such times patience remains our only strength.”
Mirwaiz traditionally delivers the Friday sermon at the Jamia Masjid in the Nowhatta area of old Srinagar city. He also heads the Anjuman-e-Nusratul Islam, a religious organisation that runs some educational institutions in Kashmir, including the Islamia High School in Rajouri Kadal area of Srinagar.
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) last month declared the Mirwaiz-headed Awami Action Committee (ACC) a banned organisation for five years. The ACC was formed in 1963 during the Holy Relic agitation by Mirwaiz Maulana Mohammad Farooq. After the elder Mirwaiz was assassinated in 1990 by the terrorists, the ACC came to be headed by his son, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq.
The MHA order said that the ACC has been encouraging youth to violence and is acting in a manner prejudicial to the interests of the state.
Mirwaiz Farooq, who is the chairman of the Hurriyat Conference, has witnessed the desertion of several affiliates. As many as 12 Hurriyat-linked organisations have broken off from secessionism, reposing trust in the Constitution of India.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah has said that “separatism has become history in Kashmir”, and the unifying policies of the Modi government have eliminated separatism in J&K. He has also said this is a victory of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision for ‘Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat’.
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