Bangalore: A one-year-old murder case returns to haunt the villagers of Ujire in Dharmasthala near Mangalore. Billed as Karnataka's Jessica Lal, the case of 17-year-old pre-university student Soujanya has now turned into one marked by dramatic protests, despite being investigated by the local police as well as the Karnataka CID. It's now headed for a third re-investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation, after the Siddaramaiah Government ordered it following massive protests in the region by Left-backed groups.
So what is it that ails this case and provokes great resentment and anger in the coastal towns of Mangalore and Belthangady? Why has such a massive movement for 'Justice for Soujanya' exploded more than a year after her death? Is there more to it than meets the eye?
Soujanya was a 17 year old pre-university student in Ujire and was reported missing on 9th October 2012, while on her way from the bus-stand to her home. Her body was found in a secluded area the next day near the bus-stop. Investigators who say they have cracked this case say she was waylaid by 40-year-old Santosh Rao, a person who suffers from both a mental illness and a sexual disorder. Police claim they caught him first, and he admitted to guilt and in fact, led them to the spot where her body was.
The investigation was later handed to the state CID, whose enquiry pretty much complements the local police enquiry. The CID report says she was sexually abused, and their findings are backed by medical evidence. They even say Santosh Rao made an extra-judicial confession to doctors who examined him after his arrest. "We submitted a report to the Government on 31st October. We have clearly stated that Santosh Rao is the culprit. We have adequate evidence against the accused. There are 10-12 pieces of evidence we have gathered," said DG (CID)Bipin Gopalakrishna in an interview with CNN IBN last week.
But both Soujanya's family and a few local activists dispute that theory, insisting that a mentally ill person could not have committed such a crime. They also fell the investigation wasn't thorough. It was based on their demands that the government ordered a CBI probe within a week of getting the CID report.
The next day however, agitators were back on the streets, with two more demands that the CBI probe be monitored by the Supreme Court and that the CBI probe extend to 462 other unsolved murders in the holy town of Dharmasthala over the last 30 years.
While on one hand they feel evidence in Soujanya's case could have already been destroyed, they also insist on a probe in 462 other cases, dragging the name of the head of the famed Dharmasthala society's head, Veerendra Heggade, in their demands. They have said often that four members associated with the locally-influential Heggade, including his nephew, are involved in the case.
"We feel the probe was not thorough. It doesn't explain where Soujanya's umbrella disappeared to. The police took her inner wear from our home and produced it as evidence from the crime scene. There are many unexplained things," says Soujanya's mother Kusumavathi.
Gopalakrishna says they have cross-checked the movements of these four men and found they all have strong alibis for the time of the murder. In fact, Heggade's nephew was not in the country and this is verified by the Immigration department.
"The four people named by the locals are not involved in the offence, we feel. We found their alibis to be sustainable, believable and true," he clarified, adding that handing over the case to the CBI was left to the government.
It was about a month ago that the family's plight captured the mindspace of the state CPI. And what seemed like a tragic rape and murder at first, has taken on political overtones.
In a way, the protests and rallies are a demonstration of the anger of people who want to rebel against what they feel is discrimination and high-handedness by a person they see as a feudal landlord in many ways. The case has become, over time, an excuse to raise a resentful voice against the Heggade family than just a call for justice for a murdered teenager.
Says Damodara Bhat, a DYFI leader from Belthangady, "Our protest is against the murder and against his land dealings. Over the last few years, the Dharmasthala trust has taken over forest land, grazing land and dalit land of poor villagers around Belthangady to put up 10 to 15 educational institutions."
(When you check documents however, the Dharmasthala institutions are spread over land granted to it by the government. One document talks of about 43.9 acres of 'DC-Manna' land - land that should ideally belong to Dalit communities. But here again, it is land handed over by the government. If it is illegal, the then government is equally to blame, it would seem.)
"When there are 20,000 to 30,000 landless people in the region who ask for government plots/ land, the government has said there is no land. But the same government has given away so many acres to the Dharmasthala trust," says L Shekar, a CPIM leader from the same taluk.
Ask them why they don't approach a court, and they say they are a bit unsure of beating an influential family in courts. "Civil case, yes we will file, we will think about it. But first we want to stage a protest. Criminal case - if there are encroachments - yes we can file a police case too, we're ready for that. But first we want to agitate," says Damodara Bhat, even as he and others refuse to think it's illogical to connect up this probe to that of other women since 1979 (they are, of late, holding up posters with photos of young women who died in this region in 1979 and 1986 as classic examples.)
After accessing some documents related to land grants to the trust through the Right to Information, they are yet to file any case though.
More agitations are being planned over the next week, as the lines get blurred between resentment and a genuine concern for justice. A re-investigation could well mean six months to a year, before a trial can begin in the case.
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