Odisha BJP demands dismissal of minister over the Nayagarh murder case.
New Delhi: The Odisha High Court on Thursday gave the state government a 13-day deadline to submit a status report on the progress of the investigation into the murder of a five-year-old girl in Nayagarh district in July this year.
The court has also directed the Nayagarh Superintendent of Police (SP) to provide security to family members of the victim. The court has scheduled the next hearing on the petition on 16 December.
A PIL was filed by the Bharatiya Bikash Parishad, which sought protection for the girl’s family on account of the alleged involvement of some politicians and local strongmen in the murder of the girl. The PIL had also sought a CBI probe into the case and Rs 25 lakh compensation to the family of the minor girl.
“We are going to continue this agitation until there is some logical conclusion. On Monday, we will be staging a protest in front of Raj Bhawan and we will put forth our demand in front of the honourable Governor. The Minister (Arun Kumar Sahoo) who is covering up and protecting the accused should be sacked and the government should take an initiative and hand-over the case to the CBI. We don’t even have 1 percent faith in the SIT as it will work on the direction of the minister concerned and the government to cover up their own party people. We will be organising a Satyagarh program in Nayagarh and from 15 December onwards; we will organise a padyatra in all the constituencies of Odisha and we will fight till the girl gets justice”, BJP spokesperson Prithviraj Harichandan told The Sunday Guardian.
Last week, BJP’s National Spokesperson Sambit Patra said that his party will take the fight of the minor girl from Nayagarh to the national capital to ensure justice to the family of the deceased. Harichandan said: “There is already evidence against the minister and it’s out now that the accused is a close aid of the minister. There are enough testimonies to support the allegations as well. These people are trying to cover this matter. This is such a heinous crime. It’s not only about the girl. In the last two years as per the NCRB report, 5,383 children are missing in the state. This is an alarming situation. If these people don’t handle this situation properly, the numbers may go up. We are also fighting for the missing children. The government is sleeping. Congress is colluding with the government not only on this issue, but on other issues too and the Congress is exposed now.”
On 25 November, after the girl’s parents attempted self-immolation outside the Assembly, the government admitted that the five-year-old child was kidnapped and murdered and had handed over the case to the Crime Branch.
After the sarpanch of the girl’s area alleged the involvement of minister Arun Sahoo in the matter, BJP has intensified its agitation across the state and demanded Sahoo’s dismissal. The party MLAs on Tuesday urged Governor Ganeshi Lal to direct the state government to hand over the case to CBI.
“The government was not serious about the case till her parents attempted suicide near the Assembly. We have all the reasons to believe that the government is trying to shield Sahoo and the prime accused of the case Babuli Nayak,” Leader of the Opposition Pradipta Naik had told media.
On Monday, the SIT headed by Inspector General of Police Arun Bothra visited Jadupur and inspected the backyard of the victim’s house where the bones of the five-year-old were found packed in a gunny bag and visited the house of the victim and spoke to her parents.
On July 14, the five-year-old girl was reportedly abducted when she was playing outside her residence in the village. Ten days later, the minor girl’s bones and body, chopped in parts, stashed in a sack, were found dumped in the backyard of their house. The Sunday Guardian tried to reach out to Odisha Congress President Niranjan Patnaik for comments, but didn’t receive any response till the time the story went to press.