Shocking details of custodial abuse of a serving army officer and his fiancee in a police station in Bhubaneswar have emerged as the officer of captain rank in the Sikh Regiment lodged a complaint on Thursday accusing the cops on duty of molesting and stripping his female friend.

The army officer and his fiancee were meted out assault on 15 September when they had gone to the Bharatpur police station to lodge a complaint in connection with a road rage case. His female companion who was arrested and sent to jail on 16 September was granted bail by Orissa High Court on Wednesday.

Advertisement

The High Court had pulled up the State police and expressed deep concern over the incident, observing that “allegation made by the accused-petitioner in the present case is an anathema to the very concept of a democratic and orderly society”.

Sensing the gravity and sensible nature of the case, Odisha police have in the meanwhile suspended five policemen including the Inspector-in-charge of the police station. An inquiry by the crime branch wing has been constituted into it.

The army officer in a written complaint to Odisha’s Additional Director General of Police (Crime Branch) Arun Bothra, alleged that “the IIC (Inspector In-Charge) upon arrival sexually harassed and molested my fiancee and I could hear the screams for 30 minutes. Thereafter my fiancee was illegally arrested and forwarded to the court.”

The serving army officer and his female friend had rushed to the Bharatpur police station to seek protection from unsocial elements after they encountered a road rage near Pathargadia area close to the highway passing through the city. As the policemen on duty at the police station insisted on a written complaint, a verbal duel ensued.

As the graphic details of the complaint emerge, the army officer was partly undressed while his fiancee was stripped by the cops.

“Whilst I was writing the complaint, four police officers held me and dragged me to one of the cells where they removed my pants and took all my belongings including my wallet, mobile phone, Army identity card and keys of my car. I was locked up inside the cell illegally at 3 am. Meanwhile my fiancee was physically assaulted by two lady police officers in the lobby”, the complaint lodged today by the Sikh Regiment officer alleged.

“The police station had one constable and an on-duty woman assistant sub-inspector of police, who refused to listen to our complaint and provide protection to us for going back home. Later the police patrol came back and I approached the sub inspector who was in-charge at the time to register an FIR.

”When the officer requested the constable to call the SI so that he could explain about the arrest protocols of an army officer that how it required either an arrest warrant from magistrate or on FIR of either rape or murder, he was told IIC would clarify as to why I was put in illegal custody from 3 am to 6.30 am”.

“I was subjected to illegal custody, harassment and mental torture. At 6 am, when my fiancee, being a lawyer by profession, demanded the arrest warrant from the police authorities, she was dragged into a room and was stripped and brutally assaulted by four male and three female police officers including the SI in-charge,” the army officer noted.