IIM-Calcutta rape case: Victim not cooperating in probe

Kolkata, July 15 (IANS) After the father of the victim in the alleged rape case that happened within the campus of the iconic Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta (IIM-C) at Joka last week denied the assault, the investigators are now facing non-cooperation from the woman.

The accused in the case, a student of the Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta, might ultimately gain an advantage in the case in this scenario, according to legal experts.

At the same time, the experts feel that if the non-cooperation on the part of the victim persists, the cops, if they desire, can start a separate investigation against her on whether she had given misleading information to the police.

The first non-cooperation on the part of the victim woman had been that despite repeated insistence from the city police, the victim did not turn up to undergo the mandatory medico-legal examination.

On Monday, she was scheduled to appear at a trial court and get her confidential statement recorded in front of the judicial magistrate. However, she did not turn up. Now it is to be seen whether she turns up at the trial court on Tuesday to get her confidential statements recorded.

Finally, she is yet to submit to the police the clothes that she was wearing during the reported incident of rape that took place at the boy’s hostel of IIM-C on the evening of July 11.

Above all, the contradictory statements from the victim and her father on the reported incident of rape are also creating utter confusion in the matter, with her father claiming from the beginning that nothing wrong had happened to his daughter.

The victim’s father stuck to his statement even as a trial court on July 12 remanded the sole accused in the case, Parmanand Mahaveer Toppannavar a.k.a. Parmanand Jain (26), to police custody till July 19.

Already, the counsel of the accused has started demanding a thorough probe into such issues of non-cooperation and confusing contradictory statements and claimed these factors could be the reason for reducing the period of police custody for his client.

Senior advocate Kasuhik Gupta said that if ultimately such non-cooperation on the part of the victim, who had herself registered the rape complaint, continues, then the possibilities of water-tight charge-framing in the case will become weak, thus benefiting the accused.

At the same time, said senior counsel Anirban Guha Thakurata, the police, if they desire, can also initiate an investigation against her on whether the preliminary information passed on by her was misleading or not.

--IANS

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