A Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court has summoned senior government officials amid a national outrage over accusations that the Hathras district administration had forcibly cremated the body of a 19-year-old Dalit girl who had been allegedly raped and brutalised.
A bench of justices Rajan Roy and Jaspreet Singh issued summons to the Uttar Pradesh additional chief secretary, director general of police and additional director general of police on Thursday, asking them to be present before the court on October 12 to explain the case.
Taking suo motu cognisance of the September 14 gang-rape and subsequent death of the teenager, the bench also ordered the Hathras district magistrate and senior superintendent of police to appear before it.
The high court bench asked all officials to come prepared with all the relevant material and documents to apprise the court of their versions of the incident.
The order was issued on the day the girl’s father has alleged that he and his family members were being pressured by the district administration to change their statement.
The court, which appeared especially upset over the police cremating the teen's body overnight, allegedly forcibly, in Hathras without her parent's consent, also asked officials to apprise the bench of the latest status of the probe into the alleged gang-rape and murder case.
The bench also asked the late teen's parent to come to the court to apprise it of their version of the incident and ordered the Hathras district administration to arrange for their travel to the court.
Family members of the 19-year-old Dalit woman who succumbed to her injuries at a Delhi hospital has alleged they were being pressured by the district administration against repeatedly changing their statement.
The father of the woman, whose death has triggered widespread criticism of the UP government, said he was being pressured by government officials and demanded a CBI probe into the matter.
The father, around 50, claimed he was pressured into going to a police station where the district magistrate and police officials made three members of his family sign some document.
“But we are not satisfied with this. My daughter's case should be probed by the CBI and monitored by a Supreme Court judge. We are under pressure from officials and confined to our home while the media has also been disallowed from meeting us,” he said in a purported video shared by Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Twitter.
The development came after another video, purportedly showing Hathras district magistrate Praveen Kumar Laxkar meeting the family at their home and allegedly asking the woman's father to reconsider if he wanted to stick with the statement or change it.
“Aap apni vishwasniyata khatam mat kariye. Media wale main aapko bata doon aaj abhi aadhe chale gaye, kal subah tak aadhe aur nikal jaenge aur 2-4 din bachenge ... Hum hi bas khade hain aapke saath mein, thik hai. Ab aapki ichha hai, aapko baar-baar bayaan badalna hai, nahi badalna hai... (You should not destroy your credibility. About the media, I must tell you, half of them have left today the other half would leave by tomorrow morning... two or four more days maybe. Only we are standing by your side, alright. Now, it is up to you whether you want to change your statement repeatedly or not...),” a man, purportedly D.M. Laxkar, is seen and heard telling the victim's father in the video circulated on social media.
A woman member of the family claimed they were being pressured by the district magistrate and feared these people “won't let us live here”, according to another purported video.
“Un logon ne mummy ke ulte seedhe video bana rakhe hain, us time haalat aise the ke jiske jo mu mein aa raha tha wo hum log bole ja rahe the... ab ye log humein yahan rehne nahi denge. Ye DM zyada hi chaalbaazi kar rahe hain, pressure daal rahe zabardasti... keh rah eke tum logon ki baton ka bharosa nahi hai, zabardasti bayaan badal rahe. Papa ko bulwa rahe keh rahe bayaan badalne se tumhari wo rahegi, hum log doosri jagah chale jaenge. (They have made random videos of mother's statements. Soon after the incident, the situation was such that we were speaking anything that came to our minds... But now they (administration) won't let us live here anymore. This DM is a trickster, he is pressuring us,” the sobbing woman alleged.