Why Early Cremation In Kolkata Rape-Murder, Questions Supreme Court’s Ex-Judge

Justice (Retired) Madan Lokur today outlined some of the lapses in the investigation in the Kolkata rape-murder case that has raised a storm of protest from the medical community across the country. In an exclusive, wide-ranging interview, he also discussed the reason why the courts are increasingly taking notice of and dealing with what essentially are hardcore governance issues.

In the current case, Justice Lokur said, the woman’s body was the evidence which was cremeted too early.

“What was the hurry? Bodies are kept in the morgue,” he told NDTV. There was also the question of delay in filing the First Information Report. “That may not have significance in terms of investigation, but the cremation was wrong,” he said.

Many have questioned the conclusions of the postmortem report, despite the state’s insistence that the whole of it was videographed.

The FIR though, was questioned by the Supreme Court earlier today.
“The body was recovered at 9:30 am. And FIR was filed at 11:30 pm. FIR about 14 hours later! Why was the FIR filed 14 hours late?” Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud had questioned.

Justice JB Pardiwala had questioned why the conclusion of the police — that it was an unnatural death — did not change in the span of a full day, especially after the postmortem.  

“If you filed a case of unnatural death before autopsy, what was the ground? If you have filed an unnatural death case after the autopsy, why did you do so? The autopsy is over and you know the cause of death,” he said.

Asked about the suo motu cognizance being taken by courts in governance issues like safety of women, Justice Lokur agreed t is an issue of failing governance.

“There is a failure in governance and that is being pointed out through the public. Now, if the court takes note that means there is something wrong which needs to be corrected,” he said.