The Supreme Court on Friday heard a plea seeking a CBI probe into the alleged murder of a five-year-old girl at Jadupur village in Nayagarh district, Odisha. The petition has been filed by the victim’s mother.
In her writ petition, the mother of the victim requested the Apex Court to direct the CBI to probe the murder. The bench of Justice A.M. Khanwilkar and Justice Sanjiv Khanna deferred the hearing on this matter till August 17 and directed the counsel of the petitioners to examine if it will be appropriate to also challenge the order passed by the High Court.
It is pertinent to mention here that one more petition has been moved by the father of the deceased girl in the Orissa High Court and orders have been passed by the High Court. Therefore, the SC bench asked the counsel of the petitioner, “Why don’t you challenge it (order)? Here the parties are different. One petition has been filed by wife, another has been filed by the husband. Issue of res judicata will arise.”
Then Senior Advocate Mahesh Jethmalani, appearing on behalf of the petitioner, prayed the bench to grant him leave to file the Special Leave Petition. Thereafter, the bench without going into the merits of the case listed it for August 17 and gave liberty to Jethmalani to file SLP.
The mother of the deceased minor girl has claimed that 75 percent of bones of her daughter are missing. “The policemen have found 12 pieces of bones along with the skull. Our body has 206 bones; so, where are the other bones? The SIT is making stories just to save the actual criminal. Babul Nayak and his gang are involved in the crime,” she alleged.
The deceased girl’s mother further claimed that her daughter was murdered for organ trade and the SIT should investigate that angle. Demanding a CBI inquiry into the case, she reiterated that Saroj (who has been arrested as the prime accused in the case) is not involved in the crime. “No bones of the deceased girl are missing. The post-mortem report has no mention of any missing bone, and the doctors too have corroborated the same.”
Meanwhile, asked why police sniffer dogs failed to trace the body, SIT chief Arun Bothra said, “The SIT hasn’t used dog squad. So I cannot comment on dog squad.”
“The towel, which Saroj used to clean blood stains after killing the 5-year-old girl, has been sent to a laboratory for testing. The accused had washed the towel several times but bloodstains were found. The towel and leggings are major evidence in the case,” he added.
Bothra had clarified that the bones of the deceased girl are not missing, but the mother of the victim alleged that the SIT head is making up stories to shield the real culprit.