PATNA: Remains of human skeletons were on Wednesday exhumed at a cremation ground in Bihar’s Muzaffarpur by Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in course of the probe into the horrific sexual assaults on young girls residing at a government-run shelter home in the town.
The skeletal remains were dug out at the Sikandarpur cremation ground by CBI officials with the help of an earth-digger machine and workers. Sources said the digging was carried out on the basis of inputs gleaned from CBI’s interrogation with Vijay Tewari, the driver of Brajesh Thakur, the main accused in the case who owned the NGO that ran the shelter home.
“The skeletal remains would be put under a forensic test followed by a DNA test. There is a strong possibility that they belong to a minor girl inmate of the shelter home who was allegedly killed after being raped and of four others who had gone missing,” said a senior official familiar with the exhumation exercise.
Digging was carried out at the spots pointed out by Vijay Tewari, who was present at the site throughout the exercise, said sources. The skeletal remains recovered are believed to be of five persons, they added. Tewari, two other associates of Brajesh Thakur and Bihar social welfare department assistant director Rosy Rani were arrested by CBI last month.
Some inmates of the shelter home run by Thakur’s NGO Seva Sankalp Evam Vikas Samiti (SSVS) had told police during the probe in July that one of the inmates was brutally killed after frequent sexual abuse and that her body was quietly buried. Muzaffarpur police, which probed the case and arrested ten people before CBI took over the case on July 29, had also carried out digging at a few sites, but found nothing.
A medical examination of 44 girls residing at the shelter home, aged between seven and 17, at Patna Medical College and Hospital (PMCH) had confirmed that 34 of them had been subjected to rape several times during their stay there. Some of these girls are aged seven years.
Patna High Court is monitoring the ongoing probe by CBI. The sexual abuses had come to light in a social audit report of shelter homes in Bihar prepared by Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS). After the scandal surfaced, Bihar’s social welfare minister Manju Verma had to resign.