Odisha government forms SIT to probe Nayagarh minor murder case

BHUBANESWAR: The state government on Saturday formed a five-member special investigation team (SIT), led by senior IPS officer Arun Bothra, to probe the murder of a 5-year girl child in Nayagarh in July, which has now kicked off a political storm since the past six days. The government also requested the Orissa high court to monitor the SIT probe.
Special secretary of the state home department Santosh Bala, in a letter to Registrar General of Orissa High Court, requested to place the matter before chief justice Mohammad Rafiq with a request to accord permission to monitor the investigation by a sitting judge of the high court.
Informing about formation of the SIT, state parliamentary affairs minister Bikram Keshari Arukh informed the state assembly that the special probe team has been formed based on the announcement of chief minister Naveen Patnaik on Friday.
Bothra, a 1996-batch IPS officer, is credited with cracking the sensational Patnagarh parcel bomb case in April 2018 and had also arrested self-styled godman Sarathi in August 2015. In the case, Bothra will be assisted by a SP and an additional SP and two inspectors of the crime branch wing of Odisha Police.
State home department sources said the terms of reference for the SIT probe will be issued soon specifying the areas to be inquired by the probe team in the sensational case.
Political slugfest over the issue continued as the opposition BJP remained firm on their demand for a CBI probe into the matter and resignation of agriculture minister Arun Sahoo. While the women wing of the saffron party staged protest across the state over the issue, the BJP MLAs also stalled the assembly proceedings for third consecutive days.
Amid pandemonium, budget discussion of the state panchayati raj department was held in the post-lunch session. The BJP MLAs also had a scuffle in the house with the marshals as they tried to climb atop the speakers’ podium and snatch the mike.
The Congress that participated in the budget discussion slammed the BJP for deliberately trying to disrupt the proceedings even as many important subjects like law and order, mining irregularities and farmers’ issue were there for discussion.
“The BJP MLAs don’t allow me to speak when I raised important issues. They said many things when Congress MPs protested against farm bills in the parliament recently and even suspended nine MPs. Now, they are stalling the proceedings here,” said Mishra, participating in the budget discussion.
Earlier in the day, senior BJD MLA Pratap Keshari Deb also came down heavily on the protesting BJP MLAs for the deadlock in the assembly.
The BJP said it would continue to protest in the assembly to press for its demand. “We will continue our protest tomorrow as well to push for our demand for a CBI inquiry into the matter and expulsion of the agriculture minister,” opposition chief whip Mohan Majhi told reporters outside.