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Independent report raises many questions on the Shopian incident

Smriti Kak Ramachandran

It punches holes in the State’s claims that the two women drowned in a nullah

— Photo: V. Sudershan

Getting to the truth: Members of “The Independent Women’s Initiative for Justice” (from left) Anuradha Bhasin Jamwal, Usha Ramachandran, Vrinda Grover, Uma Chakravarty and Seema Misra, address a press conference in New Delhi on Thursday.

NEW DELHI: The rape and murder of two women at Shopian in Jammu and Kashmir in May this year has taken agonising twists and turns, and as the “facts” of the gruesome act remain buried, an interim report compiled by a group of independent women was made public here on Thursday.

The report by Independent Women’s Initiative for Justice, submitted days ahead of the CBI submitting its own report, raises questions about the genuineness of the authorities in nabbing the real culprits. It also punches holes in the State’s claims that the women drowned in Rambi Ara Nullah.

Based on interviews with the victims’ families, the authorities and Shopian residents, the report questions the method of evidence collection, the entire chain of investigation, the efforts made to implicate the families of the deceased and the reason for what it alleges is the “hush up of the crime.”

The group, comprising Uma Chakravarty, Usha Ramanathan, Seema Misra, Vrind Grover, Dr. (Ms) Ajita and Anuradha Bhasin Jamwal, visited Shopian in August and met among others the doctors who conducted the first and second post-mortems.

“The CBI is not coming out with a full-fledged report; there have been selective leaks to the media and it looks like justice is not going to be delivered,” said Ms. Uma Chakravarty, an academic.

The report begins by questioning the sequence of events that led to the discovery of the bodies from the nullah. It points out that the nullah itself has neither the volume nor the current of water required for drowning.

“When the two women … failed to return home, a search party, comprising the family, the police and the local residents went looking for them. The police got the search called off at 2.30 a.m. It resumed at 5.30 a.m., and the police joined in between 6 a.m. and 6.30 a.m. and immediately after, SHO Shafeeq Ahmed pointed to something in the nullah, he asked the husband of one of the victims to ascertain whether it could be the women, and the bodies were recovered further downstream,” lawyer Vrinda Grover said, expressing scepticism over the sudden emergence of the bodies near the nullah in the morning.

“The doctor who performed the first autopsy, Dr. Bilal, negated the possibility of drowning, which was initially declared the reason for their death. He is now under suspension. The authorities are now trying to say that on the basis of the examination of the exhumed bodies, they have concluded that the two were not raped. But experts told us that the hymen is an extremely delicate tissue, and it cannot remain intact even months after the bodies being buried,” she said.

The group also regretted that the victims’ families were being targeted, and insinuations were being made that they could be involved too. “The four policemen accused of the crime were arrested but not put behind the bars; they were put up in some guesthouse. The investigation of the local police was marked by negligence and dereliction,” Ms. Usha Ramanathan, a law researcher, said.

Journalist Anuradha Bhasin said the crime was a manifestation of the “abuse of authority.” “Men in uniform tampered with evidence, some policemen were seen washing the signs, the rock where the bodies were found disappeared and tyre marks were removed.” She criticised the forces for failing to spell out adequate punishment for their own men. “In their own records, rapes have been described as misconduct and killings as errors of judgment and the punishment trivial.”

The report cites how the Majils-e-Mashawarat, comprising the elders of Shopian, led the demand for justice to the victims in the absence of concrete action by the State.

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