B-school rape plaint: SIT starts work with ‘zero help’ from survivor, family
Times of India | 14 July 2025
Kolkata: The nine-member Special Investigation Team (SIT), probing the alleged rape on the management institute campus, began work on Sunday with ‘zero help' from the complainant. Separate teams of investigators and forensic officials reached the campus where a 24-year-old psychologist was allegedly raped by a second-year MBA student. They aimed to examine all aspects of the case, including procedural lapses and conflicting testimonies.
According to sources, the forensic team visited the sealed hostel room and collected a host of samples, including a bottle of soft drink, a water bottle, and at least two different types of hair strands. The SIT team, led by an assistant commissioner and including three woman officers, also collected the logbook register of the main gate, hostel gate, and CCTV footage of multiple areas on the campus. Police said they have also requested the institute to allow them to speak to some students at the hostel and the security guards to map the chronology of events and corroborate facts with the complaint.
"In an ideal situation, we would have spoken to the survivor at length, got her medico-legal test done, and collected her apparel and cellphone, which are all crucial evidence in such a probe. However, we haven't been able to do this as the survivor is not cooperating. We called her to the PS but she has not come yet," said a senior officer of Kolkata Police.
TOI visited the woman's home, but neither she nor her father was there. Her father claimed on Saturday, less than 12 hours since the complaint was lodged, that there was no sexual assault with his daughter and that police pressured her to write the plaint. Cops said there have also been multiple inconsistencies between the woman's complaint and facts available with them. For example, the woman wrote in her complaint that the accused didn't allow her to enter details at the institute register when she entered around 11.45 am. However, institute officials told police and TOI that the register entry shows she entered the campus at 12.30 pm on Friday and the hostel at 12:45 pm. There is also a register entry that shows she left the hostel at 3.10 pm.
"We need to speak to a group of students, institute officials, and the security guard to corroborate these details. We also need to speak to the woman," said the officer. Meanwhile, police said they have spoken to the parents of the accused to know whether he had any past mental ailment. They also asked them if he took any medicine for the same. "The woman in her complaint stated the student, as her client, called her to the campus for a counselling session. We are trying to check whether he has any mental ailment at all," said an officer.
Police said they were analysing the call records of the survivor and the accused to determine how many times they communicated prior to the incident and the apparent duration of the calls. They are also scanning social media profiles of the two and trying to access chat histories to know since when the two communicated and the nature of communication. Police added the accused was likely to undergo medico-legal examination on Monday. A reconstruction of the event is also likely to be conducted sometime through the week.