A 22-year-old woman in Kolkata’s Baguiati area sought justice before succumbing to burn injuries, after which her husband and two others have been arrested, police said on Monday.

“Sangita Das suffered burn injuries on October 26 and she died on November 3. Her husband, Amarnath Das, 25, her mother-in-law Rima Das and Tanaya Chattopadhyay (in relation with Amarnath) have been arrested,” a police official said.

He said the initial investigation reveals an angle of dowry and an illicit relation of the husband. The third accused is the woman who is said to have an affair with Amarnath.

“We have managed to take the statement of the deceased based on which the three individuals were arrested,” he said.

IANS

A man shot dead his wife and stepson in the Bihar capital on Tuesday, police said, adding that a close relative has been detained.

The incident took place in Ishanagar in Phulwarisharif here. Neighbours told the police that the tragedy might have been the result of a family dispute.

A close relative of the main accused was detained for interrogation, Phulwarisharif station officer in-charge Mohd Qaiser Alam said.

Two teenaged sisters were strangled to death by their cousins for allegedly meeting boys in a fresh case of honour killing in Pakistan, the police said on Monday.

Bisma Bibi, 19, and Naheed Bibi, 17, were killed by their two cousins on Sunday night when they returned home after meeting the two boys, said Jamaldin Wali, police spokesperson for Sadiqabad district where the crime took place.

The two accused were waiting for the sisters near their house and later strangled them.

“They died on the spot,” Wali told Efe news, adding that it was a case of honour killing and that the accused had been arrested.

Honour crimes are very common in South Asia and often involve men killing women they believe had brought disrepute to the family name.

So far this year, 938 women and men have been victims of honour killings in the country, according to the non-profit Human Rights Commission of Pakistan.

The non-profit had also warned that unofficially the numbers might be much higher.

In 2016, the Pakistani government had passed a law prohibiting pardons to relatives of victims in such crimes, a legal loophole through which many men would earlier escape punishment after killing a woman, generally a sister or a wife.

However, human rights groups and activists warn that the law has been mostly ineffective in curbing these crimes.

At some point of time in our lives, especially in our younger days, we have all joked about selling our kidney because we were broke or wanted to buy something which was completely out of budget.

But seems like this Bangalore man took it very seriously when he actually tried to sell his kidney for Rs 1.6 crore. He claimed that he had seen an internet ad that a famous senior doctor from Columbia Asia Hospital in Bangalore had posted.

The man who has been identified as MB Somashekar claimed that Dr Arun Wesley David, the HoD of Renal Transplant Surgery at the hospital had posted this ad on a website he doesn’t remember the name of.

Since Somashekar, a stenographer by profession, was in dire need of money, he decided to sell one of his kidneys. He apparently even talked to someone impersonating as Dr David and the impersonator promised him a sum of Rs 1.6 crores for his kidney.

Somashekar then approached Aprajita Dhal, transplant coordinator at the hospital, and told her that he came to know about Dr Arun Wesley David through a website and he had had a Whatsapp conversation with him.

According to a report in a leading newspaper, an officer investigating the case said:

“Somashekar is said to have shown Dhal WhatsApp messages and subsequent conversations on various dates where Dr David’ allegedly had been in contact with him about the sale of his kidney. However, he could not remember the name of the website or its URL.”

The impersonator had asked Somashekar to go to the hospital with his Aadhaar card and other identity proofs so that the formalities for the sale could be completed.

The hospital was in for a rude shock when this man walked in and made these claims. After the incident, Dr David said that the number used in the Whatsapp conversations wasn’t his and someone was impersonating him to fool people. He filed a legal complaint regarding the same.

The Cyber Police has registered a case under section 66(C) and 66(D) of the Information Technology Act of 2000 and 120B (criminal conspiracy) 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating), 420 (cheating), 471 (using as genuine a forged document) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) along with other sections of the IPC.

This incident brings to light the sorry state of affairs in our country and how one needs to be careful and vigilant at all times lest they be fooled.

The 28-year-old man, who threatened the woman with her nude pictures was arrested and remanded to judicial custody.

It was a traumatic four months for Sunita*, a 26-year-old bank employee living in Bengaluru. Sunita was allegedly drugged by a friend, Gaurav Kumar Singh, who then clicked naked pictures of her and began sexually harassing her for four long months.

Unable to bear the torture doled out by Gaurav, Sunita decided to file a complaint with the Kamakshipalya Police on October 31. Gaurav, however, fled before the police could arrest him. The police finally nabbed Gaurav on November 2 and he was remanded to judicial custody.

In May 2018, Sunita met 28-year-old Gaurav through her older sister Sneha*. “I live with my husband in Kamakshipalya. My sister and her husband live one street away from my house and I would visit her regularly. Gaurav was my sister’s colleague and they were also friends. I was introduced to him in July when I went to live with my sister house the last few months of my pregnancy,” Sunita’s complaint states.

For several months, Sunita and Gaurav occasionally met at her sister’s residence, when one day in July, a couple of months after Sunita delivered a baby, Gaurav called her.

“He had taken my cell phone number from my sister’s phone without her knowledge. He called me one day in July and said that my sister was ordering pizza and that she wanted me to come over too. Since her house was just a few meters away, I decided to go over,” Sunita’s complaint states.

However, Sneha and her husband were not home and Gaurav was alone. He allegedly told her that her sister and brother-in-law had just stepped out for a few minutes and that they would be back soon. He offered her a cold drink and also a slice of pizza, which she consumed.

“I began feeling dizzy and I became unconscious. When I awoke, Gaurav showed me four photographs of me in a naked state. He told me that if I do not do as he says, he would send my pictures to my husband and his friends,” Sunita’s complaint states.

Gaurav allegedly began harassing Sunita from the very next day. She alleges in her complaint that Gaurav would arrive at her doorstep unannounced and would demand sexual favours from her in return for his silence on the nude photographs.

“He also forced me to consume alcohol and he also forced some pills into me. He would touch me inappropriately too. I refused to give in to his demands and his threats became more pronounced and sounded dangerous. This went on for four months. When I could not bear it any longer, I told my husband and sister. When he found out that I had spoken about what was done to me, he sent my nude pictures to my husband, his friends and my friends too,” Sunita’s complaint states.

In order to put a stop to the abuse, Sunita finally filed a complaint with the Kamakshipalya Police on October 31. An FIR was registered under section 354 (assault or criminal force to a woman with attempt to outrage her modesty), 354 A (sexual harassment) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the IPC. When Gaurav absconded, the police tracked his mobile phone and apprehended him in Bengaluru’s Sundanakatte area, where he was living with his friend. He has been remanded to judicial custody.

TNM

Five Maoists have been killed in an encounter with the security forces and ammunition recovered in Odisha’s Malkangiri district, police said on Monday.

The gun battle took place inside a forest area near Papluru village in the Kalimela late on Sunday.

A combing operation by a joint team of Odisha Police and the Special Operation Group (SOG) personnel led to the encounter in which the five Maoists, including a woman was killed, Additional Director General (Operation) R.P. Koche said.

Multiple weapons, including two INSAS rifles, a hand grenade and one SLR, were also recovered as the combing operation continued, he said.

“We have deployed additional Border Security Forces and SOG personnel to keep a strict vigil and track down all the Maoists hiding in Papluru,” he added.

“I think, this is by far the best operation of the Odisha Police against the left-wing extremists. While a huge cache of arms and ammunition have been recovered, a search operation is still on to track down the Maoists,” Director General of Police (DGP) R.P. Sharma said.

IANS

The All Indian Gem and Jewellery Domestic Council (GJC) has condemned the “harassment” of jewellers by government officials prior to the auspicious Diwali season, here on Monday.

It said that several incidents have come up in different states where the police, Railway Protection Force (RPF), Income Tax and Goods and Services Tax (GST) officials have carried out illegal raids on jewellers, especially small and medium players, marking a return to ‘Inspector Raaj’.

This has caused mental torture to the jewellers, who were already grappling with low sales during the festive season, the GJC said and added there have been complaints of officials indulging in nepotism and corruption.

To counter this, the organisation has launched a hashtag #GJCagainst #harassment of jewellers Twitter handles to provide small and medium jewelers a means to register case of harassment by government officials, said GJC Chairman Nitin Khandelwal in a statement.

He said in Maharashtra, jewellers from Nagpur and Bhusawal; and Itarsi and Kandwa regions of Madhya Pradesh, who buy jewelleries from the wholesale markets like Mumbai’s Zaveri Bazar have complained of harassment in trains en route to their respective destinations.

At least six raids have been carried out in Thane in the last few days, besides jewellers have also claimed harassment from the Metrology Department in Hyderabad.

On October 27, a jewellery consignment from Mumbai to Bhopal was allegedly confiscated at Itarsi at 4 a.m. despite having full documentation, the GJC said.

“The jeweller alleged clear harassment by the RPF by confiscating his goods and not releasing it even after repeated follow-ups with the GST, RPF and IT officials.

“In one case, a jeweller complained how the police tore up the delivery challans (note) and bills, and then summoned the GST officials to take action on him,” said Khandelwal.

He strongly denounced the “illegal action” by the government officials on the eve of a festival, especially at a time when the gems and jewellery sector was grappling with lower than expected sale (by 10 per cent, compared to 2017), depressed economic conditions and poor consumer sentiments.

“It is very sad that even after doing a compliant and systematic business, a jeweller is treated like fraud in the eyes of the police/government.

“Due to this, there is a constant fear in the industry towards the government officials,” Khandelwal pointed out.

In view of these instances of harassment, the GJC has taken to Twitter to unite and empower all jewellers across India to lodge their individual cases “to shame the corrupt officials”.

The GJC is the national industry trade federation with over 400,000 members who command a workforce of over 10 million with a turnover of Rs 2.51 lakh-crore.

IANS

TNM

A US journalist, who has accused former Union Minister M.J. Akbar of raping her 23 years ago, on Saturday slammed his statement where he said that they had a “consensual relationship”, saying that it wasn’t.

In a first person account in The Washington Post published on Friday, Pallavi Gogoi, now the Chief Business Editor at National Public Radio, gave a detailed account of how she was allegedly raped by Akbar and narrated her ordeal of working under him when he was the Editor of The Asian Age newspaper years ago.

Akbar on Friday said they had a “consensual relationship” even as his wife accused Gogoi of lying.

Dismissing Akbar’s statement, Gogoi tweeted: “Rather than take responsibility for his abuse of me and his serial predation of other young women who have courageously come forward, Akbar has insisted- just like other infamous serial sexual abusers of women–that the relationship was consensual. It was not,”

She attacked the former Minister by saying that “a relationship that is based on coercion, and abuse of power, is not consensual.”

“I stand by every word in my published account. I will continue to speak my truth so that other women who have been sexually assaulted by him know it is okay for them to come forward and speak their truth too,” Gogoi said.

With over a dozen journalists accusing him of sexual harassment and assault, Akbar quit as Minister of State for External Affairs on October 17.

Denying the charges, he filed a criminal defamation case against journalist Priya Ramani who was the first to accuse him.

IANS