162 days after RG Kar murder, 1st judgment likely today
Times of India | 18 January 2025
KOLKATA: Central Bureau of Investigation, which for more than two months argued the RG Kar rape-murder case following a high court-ordered investigation, is confident of securing the conviction of prime accused Sanjay Roy.
Sessions court judge Anirban Das is scheduled to deliver the judgment on CBI's first chargesheet on Saturday, 162 days after an on-duty PGT intern was found brutally raped and murdered on the hospital premises on Aug 9.
After it took over the case from Kolkata Police on Aug 13, the central agency recorded statements of more than 120 witnesses. During the 66-day in camera trial, the CBI counsel relied heavily on biological evidence — DNA samples, viscera and toxicology reports — apart from a layered voice analysis (LVA) to establish Roy as the perpetrator of the crime. It said saliva swab samples and DNA samples on the victim's body had matched with that of Roy. The agency claimed the victim had put up a struggle and five blunt force injuries were found on Roy's body. A clump of hair collected from the crime scene was also found to be Roy's. Besides, his Bluetooth device, which was spotted missing in the CCTV footage of his exit, was found at the crime scene and later paired with his mobile phone.
The CBI counsel termed the brutal rape and murder as a rarest of rare crime.
During the investigation, a report submitted by a multi-institutional medical board also corroborated that the victim had died after being manually strangulated and smothered.
Her spectacles were broken during the struggle, and she was bleeding from her eyes, mouth and private parts, while injury marks were found on her neck and lips.
Roy, who was arrested a day after the crime, pleaded ‘not guilty' and claimed he was being framed.
His lawyer, Sourav Bandyopadhyay, cited CCTV footage and the crime scene examination report from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory, New Delhi to argue that the way to the seminar hall, where the victim's body was found, passed through the nursing station at the TB ward and was manned 24 hours. The chances of anybody entering the seminar room without being see were very thin. It was not possible to rape and murder the doctor without being noticed by anyone within 28 minutes.