The Supreme Court on Monday granted three months time to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to complete the investigation into the Muzaffarpur shelter home case.
A vacation bench comprising Justices Indu Malhotra and M.R. Shah directed the CBI to also investigate allegations of unnatural sexual assault under section 377 of the Indian Penal Code and probe video recordings of the assault on girls at the shelter home.
The bench asked the probe agency to also investigate the role of outsiders who were involved and facilitated sexual assaults of inmates after administering them intoxicants.
The apex court directed the CBI to submit its report before it within three months in the case.
The CBI had approached the court seeking six months time to complete the probe.
Earlier in May, the top court had directed the agency to complete investigation into the case — in which 11 girls were allegedly murdered — within two weeks.
Nivedita Jha, who had moved the apex court, had accused the CBI of avoiding crucial leads to shield the perpetrators.
In a sensational revelation, the CBI had told the Supreme Court that 11 girls were allegedly murdered by key accused Brajesh Thakur and his accomplices and “bundle of bones” recovered from a burial ground.
An affidavit filed by the CBI in the top court stated that from the statement of victims recorded during the probe, names of 11 girls have emerged, who were said to be allegedly murdered by Thakur and his accomplices.
At the shelter home in Muzaffarpur, at least 34 girls – aged seven to fourteen – were allegedly drugged, raped, forced to sleep naked and scalded with boiling water. Some of the girls were also forced to undergo an abortion.
The case came to light when the Bihar Social Welfare Department filed an FIR based on a social audit of the shelter home conducted by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai.
The Supreme Court had in November last year transferred the investigation to the CBI after the Bihar government failed to handle the case with efficiency.