The CBI has booked Uttar Pradesh MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar and nine others on murder charges in connection with the truck-car collision at Gurubakshganj area of Rae Bareli that left the 19-year-old Unnao rape victim and her lawyer critically injured and two of her relatives dead.
The CBI has already chargesheeted Sengar in the rape allegation levelled by the Unnao girl. She was allegedly raped in 2017 by the MLA when she was a minor.
Besides Sengar, those named in the accident FIR include his brother Manoj Singh Sengar, Arun Singh, Vinod Mishra, Hari Pal Singh, Navin Singh, Komal Singh, Gyanendra Singh, Rinku Singh, advocate Awadhesh Singh, and 15-20 unidentified persons.
The accused have been charged with IPC sections relating to murder, attempt to murder, criminal conspiracy and criminal intimidation.
The CBI has constituted a team for “speedy and smooth investigation” of the case. The probe team reached Gurubakshganj on Wednesday.
“It was alleged that the accused persons were conspiring, threatening and harassing the family of the complainant. It was further alleged that in this matter, the accident that occurred on July 28, 2019, has resulted in loss of two lives. Also the Unnao victim and the family lawyer (both passengers in a car) are still under treatment at a hospital in Lucknow,” the CBI spokesperson said.
After collecting the case documents from the UP Police, the CBI team inspected the crime scene and the truck which had hit the white Maruti Swift car. As part of the probe, the CBI sleuths also spoke to police officers who were the first respondents after the accident was reported.
The Central agency team will also record statements of the police officers responsible for securing the woman and will seek their responses why they did not accompany the victim on Sunday when the accident took place, agency sources said.
The CBI has taken over the investigation into the case from the Uttar Pradesh Police by re-registering its FIR. The accident FIR was first registered by the UP Police on a complaint by Singh, lodged in the Rae Bareli prison.
On Tuesday, the Centre handed over the probe into the accident involving the rape victim to the CBI on the recommendation of the Uttar Pradesh Government.
A speeding truck hit the car in which the rape victim was travelling from her home in Unnao to Rae Bareli on Sunday, killing two of her relatives and leaving the rape victim and her lawyer critically injured.
The accident took place when the woman was returning after meeting her uncle Mahesh Singh lodged in the Rae Bareli prison. She has accused the BJP MLA of raping her when she was a minor on the pretext of arranging a job for her. She had also written to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court on her apprehensions of harm from the accused MLA.
The number plate of the truck was reportedly blackened and was coming from the opposite direction on the wrong side on the fateful day.
In the FIR, Singh had alleged that the family was under constant pressure from the kin of Sengar.
Sengar and his kin have been threatening to kill the entire family of the victim if the case against the MLA was not withdrawn, Singh has alleged.
Singh, whose wife and sister-in-law were killed in the accident, has also alleged that complaints by the victim’s family regarding threats to their lives were not paid heed to by the local police, the FIR said.
The Uttar Pradesh Police had on Monday filed a murder case against Sengar and nine others after the rape survivor’s family filed a complaint alleging “conspiracy” behind the car crash.