Police, hospital tried to destroy evidence, CM can’t disown responsibility: R G Kar victim's parents

Kolkata, Jan 24 (PTI) Parents of the R G Kar hospital victim on Friday said that West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee cannot disown the responsibility for the alleged attempt of the police and hospital authorities to destroy evidence of rape and murder of their daughter.

They attempted to shield the “main conspirators” behind the crime while the CBI failed to bring to book all the perpetrators and overlooked the larger conspiracy aspect, the parents alleged.

"Everyone - Kolkata Police, the hospital administration and people's representatives from the ruling TMC - played an active role to hush up the ghastly incident so that truth does not come to light,” the deceased medic’s mother told a leading Bengali TV channel.

The body of the 31-year-old post-graduate trainee was found in a semi-naked stage in the seminar hall of RG Kar Medical College and Hospital on August 9 last year. The trial court on January 20 sentenced Sanjay Roy, the lone convict, to life imprisonment till death in the rape-murder case.

"The CM cannot disown the failure of Kolkata Police, hospital and the administration,” the mother of the deceased said.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee also holds the police and health portfolios.

“The CM has to explain why the crime scene could not be sealed and the evidence was tampered with by the entry of a large number of onlookers. The CM has to explain why from the footage of 68 people moving in the area on August 9 morning till midday, only one person Sanjay Roy was identified as the sole perpetrator of the crime?” the mother said.

She claimed while the CBI did not act on the issue of alleged suppression of facts, the state administration had failed to protect a woman medic at her workplace and later tried to hide the larger conspiracy aspect of the crime.

"These matters were not properly addressed by CBI despite our testimony to the agency," the victim’s father added accusing both CBI and Kolkata Police of holding a shoddy investigation "to shield some people." TMC spokesperson Kunal Ghosh termed the allegations “unfortunate”.

“Those comments seem to be prompted by some forces which want to show the TMC and the state government in poor light to defame the CM," he said.

"It was the CM under whose instruction Kolkata Police hastened up investigation immediately after the incident and arrested Sanjay Roy. She had given a week to Kolkata Police to wrap up the probe. But the probe was handed over to CBI on an order of the Calcutta High Court,” Ghosh said.

Investigations by the state police have ensured conviction of other rape-murder cases in recent times and pronouncement of capital punishment for all those convicted persons, the TMC leader said.

He, however, said he does not want to have a war of words with grief-stricken parents of the victim. PTI SUS NN