External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Saturday, basing on the report of the Odisha Government over the trial of Iranian woman, said she is “unable to help” in the case.
“I have received the report from Government of Odisha. The trial court has convicted Narges K Ashtari to one-year imprisonment and a fine of `3,00,000. She has filed an appeal before Sessions Court which is pending. The appellate court has released her on bail pending appeal,” Swaraj tweeted.
“This is a judicial order and the matter is sub-judice. Therefore, I am unable to help in this case,” she added.
Narges Ashtari, who is Iranian by birth and British by nationality and is associated with NGO Prishan Foundation, was granted an employment visa through a Rayagada-based NGO, Asia Society for Social Improvement and Sustainable Transformation. However in 2011, Narges established her own organisation Prishan Foundation in Rayagada, an orphanage home for girls in the same district.
In 2014, while on a one-day field trip of the orphanage home, one of the blind children of the foundation fell into a river and was swept away.
She was accused of throwing the child in the river and murdering.