BHOPAL: The alleged rape and molestation of four speech and hearing impaired Industrial Training Institute (ITI) girl students by the head of a private girls hostel, Ashwini Sharma, in Bhopal is turning into a major political issue in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh.
The Opposition Congress will stage statewide protests and demonstrations over the issue at all 51 district headquarters on Tuesday.
According to Chandraprabhash Shekhar, the state Congress vice president and party's organization in-charge in the central Indian state, all district party units and frontal organizations have been asked to hold protests and demonstration at district collectorates across MP on Tuesday.
The party office-bearers in each district will hand over a memorandum to respective district collectors to make public the details of security arrangements at shelter houses and girls' hostels in the area of their jurisdiction as also details about inspections made by authorities at all concerned shelter homes and hostels, added Shekhar.
In Indore, meanwhile, state Congress' media in-charge Shobha Oza demanded the resignation of MP minister for social justice and disabled persons welfare Gopal Bharagava, for rendering "misleading" information in the serious matter.
"The minister (Bharagava) had recently told journalists that no financial grant was sanctioned by his department to the concerned private girls' hostel, which is factually incorrect. Instead, the truth is that money was sanctioned by the social justice department to the hostel run by accused Ashwini Sharma," alleged Oza while releasing before journalists an official document dated December 2016 in which clearance has been given by the department as a special case to render funds worth Rs 1800 per student to 74 speech and hearing impaired ITI-Bhopal students staying at the hostels run under Sharma's Kritarth Boys Hostel.
While alleging that the special investigation team (SIT) constituted to probe the matter is nothing, but institutional exercise aimed to cover up the matter, Oza, demanded a CBI probe into the entire episode. She also questioned why statements of only 4 molestation and rape victim girls were being recorded by SIT in the matter when there were 70 more speech and impaired students who were staying at the private hostel run by Sharma.
The Congress leader reiterated that Sharma had links with BJP and RSS and also a bonding with the CM, exposed by a video in which CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan is seen patting Sharma's back during 2013 Uttarakhand flood tragedy relief work.
In Bhopal, meanwhile, the accused Ashwini Sharma was produced before a local court, which extended his police remand period by a day till Tuesday.
Sources connected to the ongoing SIT probe confided to the The New Indian Express that under the scanner are documents of communication between Sharma and social justice department of state government, which suggest that money was sanctioned by the state government to only Kritarth Boys Hostel run by the accused. This suggested that the private girls' hostel being run by him at Crystal Ideal City (CIC) residential township in Bhopal's Awadhpuri area could have been illegal.
If sources are to be believed further, the SIT is also analyzing certain video clips relevant to the entire case.