Tamil Nadu girl’s death by suicide: High court transfers case to CBI
CHENNAI: JAN. 31 – The Madras high court’s Madurai bench on Monday transferred the case of a 17-year-old girl’s death by suicide in Tamil Nadu’s Thanjavur from the local police to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on her father’s petition amid allegations of forced conversion.
Justice G R Swaminathan ordered the transfer to the federal agency days after the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) released a 45-second video in which the girl is purportedly heard saying the warden of a Christian residential school, where she studied, asked her parents to convert to Christianity.
Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) member Muthuvel filmed the video on January 17 while the girl was battling for her life at a hospital. Muthuvel’s mobile phone has been sent to a forensic lab in Chennai for examination on the court’s directions.
The BJP sought a CBI probe into the matter and last week, the party’s chief, J P Nadda, constituted a committee to look into the suicide.
The Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary Congregation, which runs the 160-year-old school in Thanjavur, has denied the charge of conversion saying they provide secular education for all as per the Indian Constitution.
BJP leaders welcomed the high court’s order. “The fight shall continue till justice is delivered,” tweeted BJP leader B L Santosh. On Sunday, BJP state chief K Annamalai, who led a delegation that visited the girl’s family, called Tamil Nadu’s intelligence department incompetent and questioned whether it gave “a true briefing to the chief minister” about the case.
A National Commission for Protection of Child Rights team is also in Thanjavur in connection with the case.
A judicial magistrate recorded the girl’s statement three days before she died on January 19. In the statement, a copy of which HT has seen, the girl blamed her 74-year-old hostel warden for torturing her, hitting her, and scolding her to do work and audit hostel accounts.
Thanjavur district’s education officer looked into the matter and noted in a report that no complaint of any religious conversion was made against the girl’s school for a decade. The report said more Hindu students studied at the school than Christians and Muslims.
TV channels last week released a longer version of the video clip Muthuvel purportedly recorded showing the girl only blaming the warden. She is heard saying she could not focus on her studies. Amid reports that a distress call was made to Childline two years ago as the girl’s stepmother allegedly harassed her, police were also probing her situation at home too.
-Hindustan Times
