Kolkata B-school rape: Survivor skips court date citing trauma; accused undergoes medical test | Kolkata News

KOLKATA: The confidential testimony of the woman who accused a 26-year-old MBA student at a premier B-school in Kolkata could not be recorded on Monday. The govt lawyer informed the Alipore additional chief judicial magistrate’s court that the survivor was still suffering from shock and trauma following the eight-hour ordeal after the incident. Her statement may be recorded on Tuesday, the court was told.Amid this, the accused’s lawyer, Subrata Sardar, submitted a petition highlighting that the complainant’s father had denied the rape allegation in statements to the media, which have since circulated widely on news and social platforms. He urged the court to include these public statements in the case record. “The complainant’s father has categorically denied the incident. The statements are now in the public domain and must be part of the official record,” Sardar said in court.

The defence also questioned the continued police custody of the accused, pointing out that the survivor’s family had not yet consented to either a medico-legal examination or the recording of her statement. Sardar indicated that a petition to reduce the duration of police custody may be filed shortly. In response to the defence counsel’s petition, chief public prosecutor Sourin Ghosal said: “The accused has not got any say as regards mode and manner of investigation.”Later on Monday, the medico-legal test of the accused MBA student was conducted as police said the youth started cooperating with them. The survivor, however, is yet to agree to a medico-legal test, police said. Meanwhile, probing into the case, police said they have been awaiting a response from the institute to quiz at least three students whom the MBA student called during the period the woman mentioned in her complaint. Police said they are also looking forward to questioning at least two security guards at the entrance-exit gate and the hostel gate.Police said the youth so far told them that he started interacting with the woman three months ago on a dating app and met her only twice. On Friday, he informed the security office via mail that a friend would be coming to his hostel and thus hosted the woman. Cops said they were also trying to fix the duration of her stay on the campus. While she initially claimed she entered the campus at 11.45 am and stayed there till evening before she came to the PS and wrote the complaint, police probe found otherwise. “As per data by the institute, the woman stayed on the campus for 2 hours and 20 minutes between 12.30 pm and 3.10 pm. There is CCTV footage to support this. We are trying to ascertain what the woman did after she came out,” said an officer. He added they were also checking the background and educational qualification of the woman who said she was a psychologist. (The victim’s identity has not been revealed to protect her privacy as per Supreme court directives on cases related to sexual assault)