Thaindian News

Lucknow, June 16 (IANS) While two of the three policemen accused of a 14-year-old girl’s alleged rape and murder are on the run, the Uttar Pradesh government planned to book three doctors who conducted the autopsy for destruction of evidence, an official said Thursday.

The girl was allegedly raped and murdered June 10 in the premises of Nighasan police station in Lakhimpur-Kheri district, about 170 km from here.

An official, declining to be named, said that a first information report (FIR) may be lodged against the three doctors who conducted the first post-mortem examination of the girls and certified that the death was due to “asphyxia”, thereby leaving enough scope for police to dismiss it as a case of suicide.

It was the second autopsy carried out by another team of doctors from Lucknow that confirmed “strangulation” as the cause of victim’s death, suggesting murder.

The proposed action against the doctors may strengthen the government’s plea before the Allahabad High Court, where a hearing on a petition seeking a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the case would come up Friday, the official said.

While issuing notice to the government Wednesday, the court told it to furnish details of action taken in the case.

A top police official of the state told IANS: “It was quite apparent that the doctors associated with the first post-mortem had not done an honest job…their report was influenced by extraneous factors and therefore was untrustworthy.”

“We, therefore, cannot allow them to go scot free,” he said.

In a related development, the girl’s parents submitted a fresh memorandum to the local sub-divisional magistrate (SDM), reiterating their demand for a CBI probe into the crime.

This followed the refusal of the local administration to take cognisance of an earlier memorandum that was addressed to Lakhimpur-Kheri MP Zafar Ali Naqvi, who forwarded it with a covering note to the district magistrate.