KOLKATA: The accused in the alleged rape incident on the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta (IIM-C) campus in Joka is set to move court seeking to reduce the period of police custody.
The lawyer of the accused said on Monday that they will file a petition in the Alipore Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate's Court in Kolkata, seeking to reduce the period of police custody of Paramananda Toppaunawar, a second-year student of IIM-C who has been arrested by the police on the basis of a complaint of the victim.
A day after the alleged incident, the victim’s father stated that his daughter was neither raped nor tortured, said the lawyer.
The victim and her family also have not yet consented to the medico-legal examination.
“In this situation, why did the accused remain in police custody for so long,” the lawyer asked.
The Alipore court had on Saturday remanded the accused into police custody till July 19.
An application will also be filed in the court, seeking direction to the investigating officer to record and preserve all the statements of the survivor’s father that have been circulated on various social media.
According to the complaint of the victim, who is an outsider, she was taken to the IIM-C Boys Hostel in the name of counseling. She was given some food and drinks there. It was alleged that after consuming food and drinks she fell unconscious. When she regained consciousness, she found herself lying in the Boys Hostel. The victim alleged that she was raped when she was unconscious.
The Kolkata Police constituted a nine-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the incident.
Meanwhile, a senior police official said that during interrogation, the accused admitted to purchasing sleeping pills from a nearby pharmacy, which he had mixed with cold drinks and drinking water offered to the woman.
Police, however, have found several discrepancies in the statements of the accused student of the IIM-C, he said.