New Delhi: In a parallel twist in the Sunanda Pushkar case, a letter written by Congress MP Shashi Tharoor to Delhi police commissioner Bhim Sain Bassi on November 12, alleging “repeated physical assault” by policemen on his domestic help Narayan Singh to force him into “confessing” that they both murdered Pushkar, came to the fore Wednesday as Mr Tharoor’s questioning seemed to be a matter of time.
Mr Bassi categorically declared “whatever is necessary will be done”. At least two people have already been questioned after the filing of the case, sources said.
In his letter to Mr Bassi, Mr Tharoor said he and his staff had “cooperated fully” with the police investigation.
“I was therefore shocked and appalled to learn that in the course of the 16-hour interrogation conducted by four Delhi Police officers on Friday (7/11/14) and again during the 14-hour interrogation on Saturday (8/11/14), my domestic helper Narayan Singh was repeatedly physically assaulted by one of your officers. Worse, the officer used the traumatic physical assault to try and intimidate Narayan into ‘confessing’ that he and I had murdered my wife.”
Mr Tharoor also referred to his telephonic conversation with Mr Bassi on November 8 when he had expressed his concerns about the police action. “As you graciously agreed, such conduct is completely unacceptable and illegal. It also amounts to the use of physical coercion in the attempt to frame an innocent man. I would request you to take immediate and appropriate action against such unlawful misconduct of the officer concerned,” he said.
Earlier, Mr Tharoor had been accused of interfering in the autopsy and medical probe after AIIMS forensic head Sudhir Gupta had raised the matter. Reacting to the filing of the case, Dr Gupta said on Wednesday that their final report did not mention that the death was homicidal in nature.
“It is due to poisoning. The police had sought an opinion in the matter, and we have already given it. Now it is for the police to probe further,” he said.
Police sources said the procedure to send Sunanda Pushkar’s viscera samples abroad (either to Britain or the United States) to ascertain the “nature and quantum of poison” had also been initiated. “We will have to send letter rogatries (LRs) through the court,” the source said.
The intake of highly toxic substances like Polonium 210 or thallium is suspected to have caused Sunanda’s death.
Asked what evidence the Delhi police had to suggest it was a case of murder, Mr Bassi said: “When we file a case under Section 302 IPC, it means we have prima facie reasons to believe that it is a case of murder.” Asked why the murder case was registered almost a year after Sunanda’s death, he added that the final medical report from AIIMS warranted filing of the FIR so that Sunanda’s viscera samples could be sent abroad for further tests.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday, the head of the three-member medical board of the AIIMS, Dr Sudhir Gupta, on whose report Delhi Police has filed a murder case into the death of Sunanda, said that the board had said she had died due to poisoning and it had not mentioned homicide in its findings.
