CHENNAI: The Madras High Court On Wednesday issued a show cause notice (SCN) to the State Home Secretary asking why a filmy-style gang rape case and subsequent police in-action and attempt to cover up shouldn’t be transferred to the CBI for a proper investigation. Justice T S Sivagnanam, after passing the order, posted the matter for further hearing to January 29.
Demanding the transfer of the case to the CBI, the petitioner M Veerabatharappa, an illiterate farmer of Keezh Kochavoor village in Krishnagiri district, has said that his teenaged second daughter, who is differently-abled with speech and hearing impairment, was gang raped by four known persons on the evening of December 25, 2014. She was found in an unconscious state in a bush late in the evening with the aid of a torch.
After she was carried home, she conveyed, through sign language, that four known persons hit her with a wooden log before raping her. In the process, she sustained bleeding injuries in her body including her private parts. The girl even identified the four as Muthapppa, Madhappa, Rudhrappa and Chithalinga.
Owing to lack of transport facility in his remote village after sunset, Veerabatharappa could take her to the government hospital in Denkanikottai only the following morning. The doctor, who attended to the victim assured the father that a case had been registered by the All Women Police Station (AWPS) in Denkanikottai and that the personnel would pursue the case. But to Veerabatharappa’s shock, no cops came to the hospital for conducting an enquiry. After running from pillar to post, he won the support of the TN Association for the Rights of All Types of Differently-abled and Caregivers and All India Democratic Women’s Association (AIDWA), on December 31. Following an agitation announced by the outfits on January 2, the police reluctantly registered an FIR on December 31.
Pursuant to the registration of the FIR, the petitioner and his victim daughter were taken to the AWPS at Hosur in the midnight of January 1 where they were subjected to physical torture by the personnel. Inspector Jeyam slapped the girl and crushed the little finger of her leg with boots for pursuing the case.
As announced, an agitation was conducted in support of the victim on January 2. Subsequently, Veerabatharappa came to know through newspapers that a case has been registered under various Sections of the IPC and Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. When he was just beginning to believe that justice would finally be done, four village heads called on him on January 7 to inform him that his family had been ex-communicated for not settling the issue amicably.
Therefore, he filed a petition for the transfer of the case to the CBI besides demanding protection, adequate compensation, necessary medical treatment, inclusion of all relevant sections of the POCSO Act in the FIR and appropriate action against the police personnel, who abused the victim and her father. Acting on the petition, Justice T S Sivagnanam passed the interim order.