VIJAYAWADA: From the day one of the rape and murder of 17-year-old B-Pharmacy student Ayesha Meera, the investigation into the case took many twists and turns from rounding up suspects to arresting a petty criminal Pidathala Satyam Babu.
Initially, police suspected Ayesha’s classmates, a local youth and her cousins. All of them were questioned several times, but in vain.
Though Shamshad Begum, mother of Ayesha Meera, alleged role of Koneru Satish, grandson of former minister Koneru Ranga Rao, his friends Chintha Pawan Kumar and Abburi Ganesh, hostel warden Inampudi Padma, husband Siva Ramakrishna, hostel inmates Kavitha and Sowmya in the case, the police were in a hurry to close the sensational case as early as possible considering the sensitivity of the case.
Three months after the incident, police suspected one Gurivinder Singh alias Laddu alias Bobby, who has criminal history of attacking women. However, police utterly failed to establish his involvement in the incident and let him free. “To save the bigwigs, police misled the investigation and brought innocents into the scene. The entire crime scene was sabotaged,” said an advocate Pichuka Srinivas, who is closely following the case.
After five months, Vijayawada police on August 18, 2008, took Pidathala Satyam Babu into their custody. Police claimed that Satyam Babu has admitted to his crime of raping and killing Ayesha Meera. Police said footprints and handwriting, blood and DNA samples tallied with the samples collected from the scene of offense.
“When the local court gave directives to the police to conduct DNA and NARCO tests on the suspects as requested by Ayesha’s mother, police ignored the same and showcased Satyam Babu as the killer. They created confusion first by bringing various names into the case and later tried to convince the parents, public and media that Satyam Babu was the accused,” said Srinivas.
Vijayawada police faced severe criticism and opposition with parents of Ayesha Meera, Human Rights Commission (HRC), SC/ST Commission and Women Rights activists who alleged that police are trying to save the real culprits by framing an innocent.