As political parties have come out with conflicting arguments in connection with the molestation of a minor girl at Dharmadam, people here strongly express concerns over the future of the ongoing probe. Congress, CPM, CPI and their feeder organisations have started mudslinging at each other. Meanwhile, there are reports that a group of people went to the Mahila Mandiram, here, where the sexually harassed girl has been admitted, and threatened her against revealing further facts regarding the incident.
Mahila Congress Kannur district committee and Congress Dharmadam Mandalam committee jointly conducted a sit-in protest at Chirakkuni Bazar the other day.
AICC member Suma Balakrishnan who inaugurated the meet said that stern action should be initiated against the miscreants who are backed by the CPM. The local Congress leaders allege that the intervention of CPM top brass resulted in nullifying the probe related to the ‘reportedly’ suicide case of the victim girl’s sister in August 2010 when she was a class X student.
It is said that the postmortem examination report and the dying declaration of the girl were irrecoverably lost from the Dharmadam police station. Mahila Congress leaders who met Home Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan at Kannur the other day submitted a memorandum demanding a high-level probe into these issues.
CPI leaders in Thalassery share the concerns of the Congressmen in the issue. CPI women’s wing Mahila Sangam conducted a protest meet at Dharmadam on Wednesday.
Pradeep Puthukkuty, Thalassery mandalam secretary and Kannur district committee member of CPI, said that if the political intervention of any kind is affecting the probe that should be resisted.
A district committee member of AITUC and cultural activist in Thalassery who lashed out at the lackadaisical attitude of the local police said that there is every possibility that the probe may be sabotaged owing to political intervention at the top level.However, CPM local leaders negate the allegations levelled against them and pointed out that the victim girl was taken to the police station by a group of people’s representatives led by CPM leader and Thalassery block panchayat president Baby Sarojam.
“The Congress party is taking undue interest in the issue and making every attempt to divert the case, but CPM will take the issue to the State Human Rights Commission,” said Dharmadam panchayat president and CPM leader P M Prabhakaran. CPM state committee member M V Jayarajan inaugurated a meet conducted by the party and the Janatipatya Mahila Association to explain the CPM stand on the issue at Chirakkuni on Thursday.
The class teacher who gave moral support to the victim and gave her the courage to lodge a complaint with the police told Express on Wednesday that though the father, brother and an uncle of the girl were arrested, social consciousness of the area hasn’t yet awakened to the needed extent. A section of the people has even blamed that she had unnecessarily blown the issue out of proportion and emotionalised it.
Such accusations have put her in unbearable stress, the teacher added. She has serious concerns about the progress of the political interventions. “Cultural activists and humanists should take up the issue to arouse the public to the fact that there is no place for tricky moves in a case where a hapless girl was molested by her dear and near,” she said.