Puri: Even as public outrage rises day by day following a number of petitions filed in the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) over alleged custodial deaths in Odisha, five more under-trials in Puri district were admitted to Cuttack SCB Medical College and Hospital.
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The accused men were brought Saturday in critical condition, after allegedly being subjected to police brutality.
According to sources, Pipili police had arrested six persons and gave them third degree torture for around seven days in custody.
The arrested are Pratap Behera, Hafiz Khan, Jagannath Puspalak, Mohammad Tafiq, Dharanidhar Behera and Arjun Behera. Excepting Arjun, all other accused sustained injuries.
The Pipili police produced them before a local court, from where they were sent to Nimapada jail November 19 night.
However, Nimapara jail authorities outrightly refused to accommodate the accused in the jail without medical examination reports, as the five persons were found to be in critical conditions.
Later, the injured were admitted to Nimapara hospital Friday morning, where the authorities referred them to SCBMCH. Presently, conditions of all the five accused are stated to be critical.
Notably, Pipili police had arrested the six accused November 13 in connection with an attack on one police informer Sajid Hussain, who had helped the police in busting a brown sugar smuggling racket.
PNN