The Kerala Police has got solid evidence to prove that the person — with name Raghav Rajan of Puttaparthi — they had arrested in Kannur on March 8 for impersonation is none other than Bittihotra Mohanty, who had jumped parole in November 2006 while serving a seven-year-term at the Alwar prison in Rajasthan for raping a 26-year-old German national earlier that year.
A Kerala Police team that had taken Bitti, son of former Odisha DGP BB Mohanty, to Rajasthan on March 12 for gathering evidences, brought him back to Kannur early Monday morning by the Hazrat Nizamuddin-Ernakulam Mangala Express after completing their job at Jaipur and the Alwar prison.
According to Dy SP SK Sudarshan of Thalipparambu, who heads the 20-man special investigation team, the police have collected all relevant details about Bitti. The finger prints and identification marks collected from the Alwar prison clearly proved that ‘Raghav Rajan’ arrested in Kannur was none other than Bitti, police claimed.
They said they had collected all details that could establish Raghav Rajan’s real identity as Bitti and therefore, no further evidence gathering in Kerala was necessary. However, a final decision on the steps to be taken now would be decided after processing the evidences collected by the three police groups that had visited Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and Odisha.
Sudarshan said that there was no need of a DNA test to establish the identity of the arrested person. The police team which visited Puttaparthi, Andhra Pradesh had collected evidences of the forgery of documents he had committed to aid his transformation into the identity of Raghav Rajan, under which name he had studied in Kerala and got a banker’s job.
Sources said that the Kerala Police would not lose any time in preparing the chargesheet against Bitti, who had been charged with impersonation, cheating and forgery. They have got all vital information on how he had managed to organise the certificates he needed to live as Raghav Rajan of Puttaparthi.
The police team that had gone to Odisha had questioned Bitti’s father BB Mohanty and he had confirmed that the photograph of the arrested person shown to him was indeed that of his son. The Kerala Police took Bitti into custody on March 8 when he was working as a probationary officer with the Pazhayangadi branch of a public sector bank under the identity of Raghav Rajan.
“The evidences we have got are so strong that we would need nothing more to prove that Raghav Rajan is none other than Bitti. We may not need further evidence gathering in Kerala and there would be no need of a DNA test. However, this would be decided finally at a meeting on Tuesday of the entire special investigation team,” said a police source.
After jumping parole in November 2006, Bitti had gone to Puttaparthi where he had forged all the documents he had needed. It was with the help of these documents he had managed to get admission for MBA course at a professional college in Kannur and had been able to get a job in the public sector State Bank of Travancore.
Police sources said that they would produce Bitti in the court on Wednesday, the day the period of his custody with the police, would end. He would most likely be handed over after that to the Rajasthan Police who would need him in their custody for evidence gathering and
questioning.