Even as the Chennai City Police is groping in the dark in search of the murderer of S Swathi, the 24-year-old software engineer, who was killed last Friday in broad day light at a suburban railway station by a stranger, report of another girl committing suicide at Salem over the apathy of police towards a person, who posted a morphed nude picture of her has shaken Tamil Nadu.
Twenty-one year old Vishnupriya committed suicide late on Monday, when she was informed by her friends that a person, who has been harassing her for sometime, had posted a morphed nude picture of her on her social media page along with the mobile number of her father.
According to the girl's father, he had complained to the Salem Superintendent of Police on June 23, when a morphed nude picture of his daughter was posted on her social media account for the first time. But the police’s indifference to the complaint encouraged the suspect to post another picture on Sunday, resulting in Vishnupriya taking the extreme step.
In Chennai, the first bench of the Madras High Court, consisting of Chief Justice S K Kaul and Justice R Mahadevan, taking suo motu cognizance of a letter from another judge N Kirubakaran, issued notice to the Union and State Governments to file a reply in four weeks on why a law should not be passed to ensure the safety of the public.
Following the failure of the police to make any breakthrough in the Swathi murder case even after five days, the BJP, struggling to get a foot in Tamil Nadu, staged a protest demonstration in the city on Tuesday. The demonstration was led by Tamil Nadu BJP chief Tamilissai Sounderarajan, who is also the daughter of senior Congress leader Kumari Ananthan.
l Ganeshan, senior BJP leader, pointed out that the police is clueless about the murder of Swathi. "They (the police) is yet to come to a track. Then only we can tell whether the probe is on the right track. It is also unfortunate that nobody from the Government’s side called on the parents of Swathi after her gruesome murder," said Ganeshan.
He said the Chief Minister should have deputed at least one Minister from her council of Ministers to call on the bereaved family and console them.
T K Rajendran, commissioner of police, who courted controversy the other day with his statement that railway stations were out of the jurisdiction of the local police, told reporters that the police hope to arrest the suspect soon. He also said law and order in Tamil Nadu is not as bad as it is made out to be. "Though there has been an increase in the number of murders in the city, the situation is not as alarming as it is projected," said Rajendran.