LUCKNOW: A day after the death of CBI's key witness Yunus in Unnao rape case in which survivor's father had died in police custody, the family of the deceased witness met Unnao SP on Thursday to state that Yunus had not been keeping well for the past several months and that he died of a chronic liver ailment.
BJP Unnao MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar is the main accused in the rape case and in jail while CBI has been conducting the probe into the case. Yunus was the key witness in the assault case of Unnao rape survivor's father who finally died in police custody owing to internal injuries. He was thrashed by Unnao rape case accused BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar's younger brother Atul Sengar and his four accomplices.
Yunus had died under mysterious circumstances on last Saturday and his body was buried immediately by his family without informing the CBI or the district police.
Talking to media persons, Yunus' wife said that he was diagnosed with cirrhosis of liver four months back and had been undergoing treatment at various hospitals in Kanpur and Unnao since then. He expired due to his prolonged illeness on August 18.
"Yunus was on bed for past three months and undergoing treatment. He was being treated by retired LLR hospital doctor, Dr Arun Nigam. He died on August 18 and was buried thereafter. We will under no circumstances let Yunus' corpse exhumed for the post-mortem examination. He died a natural death," said deceased Yunus' brother Mohammad Raes.
Raes had come to Unnao SP Harish Kumar's office where he met the senior official and gave him an application mentioning that the claims made by rape survivor's family were false. Notably, rape survivor's family on Wednesday had alleged that Yunus was allegedly poisoned to death by the jailed MLA's henchmen. Her uncle had met the Unnao SP to demand that Yunus' body should be exhumed for conducting autopsy to ascertain reason for his death. For this, he had uncle had given an application in the Unnao SP office as well.
Deceased Yunus other sibling Jaan Mohammad who also accompanied the family SP office, said:"The girl's (rape survivor) uncle has submitted a false application in the SP office. He took me along in his vehicle yesterday (Wednesday) and told me that if I will get Yunus' post-mortem conducted, our family will get Rs 10-12 lakh from the government. But we will let the body exhumed," said Jaan Mohammad.
He clarified that body of Yunus was not buried in a huff. However, the fact that Yunus was suffering from liver ailment was corroborated by Circle Officer, Safipur, Vivek Ranjan Roy who told the media persons that the prescriptions of various doctors showed that Yunus was under treatment since 2013. CO Roy, who was conducting an inquiry into the death of Yunus, said that the CBI witness was being treated by Dr Ashok Verma of Kanpur, Dr Arun Nigam of Shuklaganj and one Dr Katiyar of Lucknow.
"Yunus died at around 8 am on August 18. According to the family, doctors had given up on Yunus. The entire matter is being interrogated by me. Necessary action would be initiated if required", Roy said.