Key accused Sandeep Sisodiya in the alleged gang rape and gruesome murder of a 19-year-old Dalit girl from Uttar Pradesh’s Hathras was frustrated after the victim ignored him, the charge sheet filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has said.
The 19-page charge sheet filed before a local court, that IANS has accessed, claimed that Sandeep and the victim had developed acquaintance two or three years back, which gradually developed into a “love affair”.
The CBI claimed that during the probe “it came on record that Sandeep and the victim used to meet in isolated places”, which have been supported by many witnesses.
It further claimed that Sandeep had three mobile numbers and they were in touch through these mobile phones between October 17 last year and March 3 this year.
“The fact has been established through the call detail record (CDR) analysis of all the numbers of Sandeep and the victim. There are a total of 105 calls during the period from October 17 last year to March 3 this year,” it said.
The CBI said that there were 39 calls from Sandeep to the victim’s family and 66 calls from the victim’s family to Sandeep. “However, all the family members of the victim affirmed during their examination that they have neither called nor spoken to the accused, Sandeep, over the phone,” the CBI said.
The CBI also claimed that the witnesses have told the investigating agency that the victim’s family had found out about their relationship and they had a fight about it outside Sandeep’s house.
After the fight, the calls between Sandeep and the victim stopped.
The CBI also said that further analysis of the CDRs of Sandeep and victim and mobile calls pattern from October 2019 and March this year indicates that there were short duration calls from the side of the victim to Sandeep which was followed by long-duration calls from him to the victim’s number.
“This establishes that the relationship or affair between victim and Sandeep was in good form till March this year. Thereafter, no calls were made from the victim’s family’s number to Sandeep which shows that their relationship ‘was disturbed’,” the CBI claimed in its charge sheet.
It further claimed that later their relationship came into the knowledge of their family members which further dented their affair.
“But Sandeep had tried to contact the victim from various numbers of his friends and relatives after March this year. The CDR analysis has established that Sandeep used the phone of one of his relatives and another accused Ramu’s relative’s phone and his friends’ phones to contact the victim,” the CBI said.
The CBI also said that an examination of Boodev, a friend of Sandeep revealed that he contacted on victim’s number four times and tried to arrange for a conference call between the two.
“During the examination, Boodev stated that the victim was avoiding Sandeep and his mobile calls for some time. Because of the change in her behavior, Sandeep was frustrated and he had a suspicion that she was having an affair with her sister’s husband or his brother.
This change in their relationship aggravated the situation, the CBI stated in its charge sheet.
The Dalit woman was allegedly gang-raped by four upper-caste men in Hathras on September 14 this year. She died on September 29 at Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital during treatment.
The police’s handling of the case — particularly the late-night cremation of the victim allegedly without the family’s approval — led to angry protests across the country.
The officials, however, maintained that the cremation was done “as per the wishes of the family”.
CBI officials said that they have looked into the role of accused Sandeep, Luvkush, Ravi, and Ramu, who are in judicial custody, and they have also been put through different tests at the Forensic Science Laboratory in Gandhinagar.
The CBI had constituted a special team to probe the case as it was handed over to its Ghaziabad unit. The team has recorded the statements of the victim’s family.
The Yogi Adityanath government faced a lot of flak on the handling of the case which was later transferred to the CBI.