MC Bhandare

Bhubaneswar, Feb. 13: Governor M.C. Bhandare has advised the State Commission for Women to conduct a fresh probe into the Pipili gangrape case, a week after the panel, in a report, claimed that there was no evidence of sexual assault in the case.

Bhandare met commission chairperson Jyoti Panigrahi on Saturday to discuss the report. Critics said Panigrahi’s report was inconclusive and she seemed to have jumped the gun by claiming that there was no sexual assault even before the crime branch or the expert team from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Delhi, could submit their reports.

Eversince, the Opposition has been demanding Panigrahi’s resignation dubbing her as an “agent of the BJD”, who was trying to save the government’s face.

Panigrahi sought to defend herself. “The governor just advised me to dig deeper into the case. Let us wait for the report of the AIIMS team. If the governor finds any discrepancies and asks me to probe further, then I would definitely do that,” she said.

In her report to the state government, Panigrahi said: “I perused the photocopy of the FIR and found that no allegation of sexual assault on the victim nor the name of any accused person was mentioned in it.”

She had also mentioned that the medical reports of authorities of Capital Hospital, Bhubaneswar, and SCB Medical College and Hospital, Cuttack, suggested that injuries on the neck of the victim, who continues to be in a state of coma at SCB, was caused by partial hanging.

“So, the allegations of sexual assault did not arise and even she was not given any kind of (medical) treatment to the assault till December 14 last year. Surprisingly, the alleged victim’s guardians also remained silent about the whole episode till January 7 without any justified ground. No complaint was even given by her relatives to the doctor for sexual assault,” she stated.

Seeking action against the doctors examining the girl, she averred that according to law, it was the doctor’s duty to inform the police when they came across cases of “partial hanging”. This lapse on part of the doctors had delayed probe and treatment, she said.

Last week, the SCB hospital authorities submitted a status report in Orissa High Court. It said the victim was suffering from fever last week and there had been no improvement in her condition.

On January 28, a four-member team from the AIIMS had visited the victim at SCB hospital on the request of the crime branch of Odisha police, which has arrested four accused. The experts, led by forensic medicine professor T.D. Dogra, had conducted a few medical examinations and X-ray of the victim.

A week later, member secretary of the National Commission for Women Anita Agnihotri had visited the victim’s village — Arjungoda in Pipili — where she was allegedly gangraped on November 28 last year. Following a public uproar over the incident and pressure from the Opposition, Pradeep Maharathy, who represented Pipili constituency, had to step down as agriculture minister.