Bhubaneswar: Odisha DGP Y B Khurania on Wednesday suspended five cops, including former IIC of Bharatpur police station Dinakrushna Mishra and 3 women officers, in connection with the alleged custodial misconduct and molestation of the fiancée of a serving officer of Indian Army as the incident snowballed into a major embarrassment for the state police.
The other suspended cops include SI Baisalini Panda, ASIs Salilamayee Sahoo and Sagarika Rath and constable Balaram Hansda.
“A disciplinary proceeding is contemplated against these police personnel for their gross misconduct. During the period the order remains in force, they will remain under the disciplinary control of Commissioner of Police, Bhubaneswar-Cuttack,” an office order said.
This came a day after the Twin City Commissionerate Police (CP) transferred Mishra to the office of DCP, Bhubaneswar, to facilitate fair investigation into the case by the Crime Branch and posted Deepak Kumar Khandayatray of CP Headquarters as the IIC of the police station Similarly, Sahoo was also shifted to DCP office and Hansda to RO, Bhubaneswar.
Following the directive from the DGP, a five-member team of the Crime Branch also visited Bharatpur police station, questioned the cops for over four hours and examined the case documents the previous day.
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The Army officer posted in West Bengal and his fiancée, a techie and a local, were allegedly brutally assaulted by on-duty cops at Bharatpur police station here when they approached to register a complaint of road rage in the early hours of Sunday. The couple also accused police of attempting to cover up their wrongdoings by releasing a statement falsely accusing them of assaulting and misbehaving with their staff.
The Major was allegedly kept in the lockup and when his fiancée protested, she was allegedly taken to a secluded room by a female officer, where she was assaulted, stripped and molested. Bharatpur police station IIC even allegedly threatened to rape her. The Major was also manhandled and detained for over 10 hours before being released following intervention by Army authorities, the complainant had alleged.
The woman was later arrested for creating fracas at the police station and assaulting a woman cop.
Her father, who is president of ex-servicemen association, alleged that police had arranged a ‘false report’ from the Capital Hospital to implicate her in a false case.
Bhubaneswar DCP Prateek Singh had earlier refuted these allegation. “None of our staff ill-treated the couple. It was the couple who misbehaved with our on-duty personnel. The officer’s fiancee attacked a woman cop and damaged a computer. She has been arrested. The officer was served a notice & let off, when he complained of illness,” TOI reported quoting him.
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