CBI to probe Bulandshahr gang rape case

The Allahabad High Court on Friday ordered a CBI probe into the Bulandshahr gang rape case, a day after the Samajwadi Party government in Uttar Pradesh had filed a status report on the investigation into the case.

The court observed it was “not satisfied” with the police investigation.

The court had taken

suo motu cognisance of the incident, in which a woman and her minor daughter from Noida were gang raped near a highway in Bulandshahr in western Uttar Pradesh on July 29.

A Division Bench of Chief Justice D.B. Bhosale and Justice Yashwant Varma passed the order and directed the State government to produce the FIR lodged in the case, the medical reports of the victims and other documents regarding by August 17.

Even as it said it would monitor the investigation, the court also sought to know that steps the State government was taking to prevent such incidents in future. The U.P. police had, earlier this week claimed to have cracked the case as it arrested the alleged main accused in the case Saleem Bawariya and two others after a major hunt.

The court’s order came a day after the BJP, led by its State president Keshav Prasad Maurya, submitted a memorandum to UP Governor Ram Naik demanding a CBI probe. "Welcoming" the decision, Mr. Maurya said the court had shown a “mirror” to the State government. He also urged Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav to constitute a CBI probe in other recent incidents — the alleged exodus from Kairana, the Etah hooch tragedy and the Jawahar Bagh violence in Mathura.

The Congress also attacked the SP saying the court’s intervention reflected the negligence of the State government and "inefficiency" of its police.

“It proves there is a jungle raj established in UP. Law and order has collapsed and police has no control over things,” said Satyadev Tripathi, chairman of communication department of the U.P. Congress.

On the back-foot, the SP government accused the opposition parties of “unnecessarily” fermenting a hysteria over law and order, and said Mr. Yadav's “quick actions” wherever necessary had helped bring the situation under immediate control.

“Those irritated by the SP government have no hesitation in describing ropes as snakes. The NDA government has no interest in dealing with crimes in BJP-ruled States but all they want to do is advice others,” said Rajendra Chaudhary, SP Cabinet Minister and spokesperson.

He accused the opposition parties of trying to spoil the law and order situation in the State by linking incidents of personal animosity and gang war as general problems of law and order.