The Crime Branch of Kerala Police has found criminal conspiracy in a five-year-old case where the genitals of a monk were chopped off by a 23-year-old law student from Thiruvanathapuram.
The student had allegedly attacked Swami Gangeshananda and chopped off his penis as he tried to sexually attack her in her house on the intervening night of May 19 and 20, 2017.
The Crime Branch had ordered a re-probe in the case in May 2020 after the victim changed her statement and withdrew the case. Gangeshananda also had complained to the DGP and claimed a conspiracy by some top police officials to ‘frame’ him in the case and accused his former aide Ayyappadas as the prime suspect.
The police had earlier registered a case of rape against Gangesananda as the girl’s complaint was that ‘she attacked him when he tried to abuse her’. Gangeshananda had earlier stated that he ‘himself chopped off his genitals’ but later changed his statement and deposed that ‘someone attacked him when he was asleep’.
However, the girl, nearly a month after the incident, altered her statement and declared that Gangesananda had not tried to harass her and that he had been attacked by his former aide Ayyappadas.
The probe also found that there was a serious lapse in the local police investigation. In its report, the crime branch officers had blamed the preliminary police investigation for making Gangesananda the only accused, and questioned why there was no probe into how and why the girl changed her statement.
The probe has now found that the incident was not a random one, but the result of a criminal conspiracy between the woman and her lover, Ayyappa Das. The duo planned an attack as they thought it was Gangesananda who had an influence on the girl’s family and was trying to put hurdles in their marriage.
A day before the attack, the couple hatched a plan at the Kollam beach, 70 km from the girl’s house. Ayyappa bought a knife and they together watched videos on how to chop off the genitals.
According to the Crime Branch, the history of Google searches is also evidence of their plan Based on the scientific tests, the Crime branch also concluded that Gangesananda’s statement that he was attacked in his sleep also was false.
The probe agency then sought legal advice from the Advocate General (AG) on whether the couple could be prosecuted based on the new findings. It also sought legal advice on whether a fresh charge sheet could be filed in the first case against Gangeshananda.
The girl, in her first statement, had also alleged then that Gangesananda had sexually abused her when she was a minor. The Crime Branch found that the police investigation exclusively based on the first statement of the girl was inaccurate.
Read all the Latest News India and Breaking News here
Comments
0 comment