Bengaluru/New Delhi: Supreme Court Mondayordered Karnataka police to thoroughly probe the 2012 rape and murder of a 17-year-old college girl in Dharmasthala, about 70km from Mangaluru, reopening one of the state’s most disturbing unsolved crimes.
Santhosh Rao, who was arrested, was acquitted by a CBI special court in June 2023 for lack of evidence. Senior advocates Shobha Gupta, Anand Sanjay M Nuli and Shekhar G Devasa pressed for a fresh probe by an independent SIT, preferably headed by a former Supreme Court judge. They pointed to serious lapses by the state police, CID and CBI. Karnataka additional advocate general Avishkar Singhvi, on the court’s suggestion, agreed to constitute an SIT for the reinvestigation. The SIT’s mandate was limited to the mass burial claims. Officials maintained the Dharmasthala rape-murder case could not be reopened without a court order. The whistleblower was later arrested on charges of perjury, and the SIT has largely found his claims to be fabricated.
Karnataka high court dismissed the victim’s mother’s plea for a fresh CBI investigation on Aug 20, 2024, but observed that further investigation was needed and questioned whether someone other than Rao could have been responsible.
The girl’s family has maintained Rao was “wrongly implicated” and that the real perpetrators were being shielded.
The top court, which had reserved its judgment on July 22 on a fresh probe, observed that the prosecution failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt and directed action against erring officers. Opposing the move, the CBI counsel argued that the agency took over the case in 2013 and filed a chargesheet in 2015, and that a fresh probe after the trial would unsettle criminal jurisprudence.
Earlier, Supreme Court had come down heavily on CBI for its “poor” and “non-independent” handling of the case, noting officers did not even visit the crime scene or record the mother’s statement.