NEW DELHI: NEW DELHI: West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday criticised the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), alleging that the case involving the rape and murder of an on-duty doctor at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital was forcibly taken away from the Kolkata Police.
Banerjee claimed, “The case was forcibly taken from Kolkata Police, had it been with them, it would have ensured the death sentence” of the convict Sanjay Roy.
Expressing dissatisfaction with the court’s verdict, Banerjee said, “I am not satisfied” with the life-term sentence handed to Roy. Advocating for capital punishment, she said, “All of us demanded death sentence but the court gave life imprisonment.”
On Monday, a Kolkata court sentenced Sanjay Roy to life imprisonment after convicting him of raping and murdering a postgraduate trainee doctor at the state-run hospital on August 9 last year. The crime, which sparked nationwide protests, was ruled out of the “rarest of the rare” category by additional district and sessions Judge Anirban Das, who presided over the case in the Sealdah court.
The court found Roy guilty under Sections 64 (rape), 66 (punishment for causing death), and 103(1) (murder) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS). Judge Das directed the state to pay Rs 17 lakh as compensation to the victim’s family, including Rs 10 lakh for the death and Rs 7 lakh for the rape.
“Since the victim died while on duty in the hospital, her place of work, it is the responsibility of the state to pay compensation to the family of the doctor,” the judge stated.
Meanwhile, Rekha Sharma, former chairperson of the national commission for Women (NCW) and Rajya Sabha MP, expressed disappointment with the verdict. She said, “It is very unfortunate. I think the investigations done by Kolkata Police were presented in front of the CBI, and because of the shortcomings in the investigation, the convict was sentenced to life imprisonment and not the death penalty. The victim’s family and all of us are really sad. It is the insensitivity of the judges that such a huge case was not called rarest of the rare cases.”
