Bhubaneswar: The Orissa Human Rights Commission (OHRC) has issued a notice to a DSP and an inspector of Bargarh district in connection with a case where a missing minor boy was portrayed as dead in the chargesheet.
According to a source, after the minor son of Manoranjan Dandasena from Pipali village under Paikamal police limits in Bargarh district went missing, a missing complaint was lodged at Padmapur police station December 7, 2016 since he was staying at Padmapur at the time.
During the course of investigation, Paikamal police seized a mobile phone and arrested Halu Gurla and Raghav Nayak in connection with a robbery incident. Later, allegedly based on the confession of the accused duo, the cops pressed murder and attempt to tamper with evidence charges on them. The chargesheet was filed accordingly.
To everyone’s surprise, Manoranjan’s son returned home from Kolkata May 8, 2018 which proved that the investigation was shady at best. It not only portrayed a living person as dead but also charged two men with a crime they didn’t commit.
Several human rights activists including Biswapriya Kanungo had approached the OHRC in connection with this case following which the Commission had asked the Crime Branch to investigate and submit a report.
Subsequently, Crime Branch submitted its report Oct 30, 2018. Based on the complaints of the activists and the Crime Branch report, the Commission had served a notice on DSP LN Mohanty and inspector Prakash Kumar Karna asking them to submit their response by September 26, 2019. That said, neither of the officers either submitted their response or sought more time.
OHRC member Asim Amitabh Das has issued a notice on both officers again and has asked themselves to submit their response by October 30.