The 23-year-old friend of the MBBS student raped near the campus of her private medical college in Durgapur was arrested on Tuesday night after three days in detention.
Durgapur-Asansol police commissioner Sunil Kumar Choudhary told a media conference before the arrest that the “behaviour” of the friend, whom he did not name, was not above suspicion. Announcing the arrest, his deputy said there were discrepancies between the friend’s statement and that of the victim. Choudhary said “the sexual and physical assault” appeared to have been carried out by one person.
With the arrest of the friend, with whom the girl had gone out for dinner on Saturday night, the number of those in custody rose to six.
“The friend of the gang-rape survivor has been arrested. The arrested person is a second-year student of IQ City Medical College and Hospital. He has been arrested because there are discrepancies between his account of the incident and that of the survivor. He will be produced in a local court tomorrow (Wednesday),” assistant commissioner of police of Durgapur-Asansol Subir Roy told The Telegraph.
Commissioner Choudhary had said minutes earlier that the behaviour of the victim’s friend was not above suspicion and that he was being questioned along with the five already in remand.
Choudhary said it appeared that the “sexual and physical assault” was committed by one person. Asked if that meant it was not a case of gang rape, the officer said: “The sexual, physical assault was done by one person. But the FSL (forensic science laboratory) report and other reports are awaited... this is it so far.”
“What the victim has said... she went with him, and then the incident took place.... One accused committed the rape. The roles of the others are being examined. We are interrogating the friend,” he added.
Asked if the act had been consensual at some stage, he said: “Part of the investigation. Only the facts of the case, at this stage, I am sharing with you.”
Choudhary said forensic samples had been collected and a reconstruction of the crime scene carried out. Earlier in the day, the police took the victim’s friend and the five others to the crime scene at Paranganj and reconstructed the October 10 incident. Police sources said the crime took place within a kilometre of the IQ City Medical College and Hospital in Durgapur.
Responding to allegations that Asansol-Durgapur police swung into action only after pressure from Odisha chief minister Mohan Charan Majhi, Choudhary said local cops had begun an investigation immediately after receiving a written complaint from the hospital authorities at 3.38am on October 11.
“We guarded the place of occurrence and started... the investigation,” he said. “The five principal accused were arrested within two days, medico-legal tests were done. The victim’s phone was recovered immediately,” the commissioner said.
Asked if the police were cooperating with the family, Choudhary said: “We were, are and will continue to be with the victim and her family.”
“Every doubt of theirs, we have tried to clear, with regard to the investigation. We are concerned about their security, and are willing to offer personal security. The victim is already being guarded personally.... Me and other senior officers have been in direct touch with the father, and they have all our numbers,” he added.
Earlier in the day, the police recovered the clothes of two of the arrested accused — Nasiruddin Sekh and Reajuddin Sekh — from their home in Bijra. The police said the accused were wearing these garments during the crime.
HC leash
Calcutta High Court on Tuesday issued an interim order restraining the entry of any person to the compound of the private medical college and hospital in Durgapur without obtaining prior permission from the authorities.
